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THE RELATIONS 



OF .♦ 



CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE 



TO 



MENTAL CULTURE. 

% Discourse to tlje 
GRADUATING CLASS OP WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY, 

JULY 1848. 



BY STEPHEN OLIN, D.D. 



3Sr£ii3-19ork: 



PUBLISHED BY LANE & SCOTT, 

200 Mulberry-street. 
JOSEPH LONQKING, PRINTER. 

1848 



OF 






Mi/^sai 



isG-to^ 






Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1848, by 
LANE & SCOTT. 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Southern 
District of New-York. 



Tiieol, Sea, 



/ji-'^ia/^s 



THE RELATION 

OF 

CHEISTIAN PRINCIPLE 

TO 

MENTAL CULTURE. 



As he thinketh in his heart, so is he. — Prov. xxiii, 7. 

It is a recognized principle of ethical philo- 
sophy, no less than of the gospel, that the 
quality of actions, considered as virtuous or 
vicious, resides wholly in the intention. The 
external bodily movement, which we term 
the ^ction, and which is the apparent cause 
of the effect produced, has really no moral 
chaifacter. It is neither good nor evil in 
itself; and in forming our judgment of hu- 
man conduct we might reject the external 
manifestation altogether, had we some other 
clew to the mental condition of which it is 
the exponent. But " the tree is known by 
its fruit.'' It is by attentively observing the 



6 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

actions of men that we are enabled to ar- 
rive at satisfactory conclusions concerning 
their intentions, which alone are deserving 
of either praise or blame. " As a man think- 
eth in his heart, so is he/' He may be a 
thoroughly good man—" pure in heart/' just 
in the sight of God ; and yet, through some 
fault of his position, or some negligence, or 
some untowardness in his methods of mani- 
festation, he may impress the beholder un- 
favorably — may incur a most undesirable 
reputation. He may, on the contrary, stu- 
diously maintain all the decencies and sem- 
blances of many virtues ; may, for sinister or 
selfish ends, perform good deeds rivaling 
in their number and usefulness the highest 
achievements of the most approved and 
unquestionable piety; without making the 
slightest approach toward the fulfillment of 
his duties as a moral being : " As he think- 
eth in his heart, so is he.'' Outward per- 
formances are of no worth apart from the 
motives in which they originate. The same 
overt act is either a virtue or a crime, 
according to the intention of the agent. 
Several men bestow money upon a poor 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 7 

neighbor : the first gives it as the price of 
waylaying an enemy ; the second, to pur- 
chase a vote ; the third, to reheve pressing 
want; the last, as the steward and dispenser 
of God's bounty intrusted to him. This 
one act of giving to the poor is so modi- 
fied by motives as to be in the first instance 
an atrocious crime ; in the second, gross 
profligacy ; in the third, an act of charity ; 
in the fourth, a deed of Christian piety. So 
true is it of every man, in regard to every 
act of his life, that he is as his intentions 
are : motive, not performance, determines 
moral character. 

The same maxim is true when applied to 
intellectual character : " As a man thinketh, 
so is he.'' The human mind is as the 
thoughts with which it is chiefly conversant. 
It is very much the creature of its own 
ideas. The man who from early life has 
been familiar with topics and interests of 
great significance, is educated by them. His 
intellect takes its character and coloring 
from the ideas which habitually act upon it 
and dwell in it. Even the sights and sounds 
that engage his outward senses — the beautiful 



8 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

landscape, or the sublime mountain scenery 
upon which he has long been accustomed to 
gaze ; the roar of the cataract which sends 
forth its thunder night and day near his dwel- 
ling-place — will by and by be found to have 
filled the imagination and the memory with 
images and recollections, and the heart with 
sentiments, which are likely to exert a strong 
and permanent influence upon his mental 
capacity, character, and destiny. Still more 
must every-day pursuits, and the profound 
interests that suggest the current topics of 
conversation and thought, and that impose 
upon the mind its most stirring, strenuous 
employments, leave upon it durable impres- 
sions, and become chief and influential con- 
ditions of its development and growth. If 
two individuals, equal in capacity and edu- 
cation, spend their lives in a great industrial 
establishment, the one as owner or superin- 
tendent, the other as a common laborer; the 
master is likely to become a man of decided 
ability, of comprehensive views, inventive 
genius, and sound judgment, while the opera- 
tive makes no progress beyond the acquisi- 
tion of some degree of skill in his own spe- 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 9 

cial department. The first has a variety of 
interests to consult, and responsibiUties to 
meet ; has questions to settle, and decisions to 
make, every day or hour, upon which are 
suspended results of no inconsiderable mo- 
ment. This gives variety, multiplicity, and 
activity to his ideas, and the mind expands 
and acquires new vigor by such processes. 
The work of the subaltern, on the contrary, 
is mere routine, and his mind stagnates and 
dwindles amid the incessant monotonous 
whirling of spindles and water-wheels. It 
is no unusual thing for travelers in Turkey 
and other oriental states to meet with high 
public functionaries totally ignorant of all 
the arts and sciences, a knowledge of which, 
in our part of the world, constitutes educa- 
tion. Many of them, however, are men of 
decided ability, who discharge the duties of 
their high stations with the utmost propriety. 
The most sagacious and successful ruler in 
the East knows nothing of literature and 
science beyond the poorest skill in reading 
and writing, and this he acquired after his 
elevation to supreme poWer, at forty years 
of age. These men are educated by the 



10 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

important responsible employments which 
give constant play to their intellectual facul- 
ties, and enlarge the mind by habitual fami- 
liarity with significant ideas. That is likely 
to become the most powerful intellect which 
is most constantly and earnestly busied with 
great thoughts and great designs. Every 
religious congregation affords good illustra- 
tion of this truth. We never fail to observe 
a higher tone of intelligence as well as piety 
among a people accustomed to contemplate 
and devise extensive schemes for doing 
good, not at home merely, but in distant lands 
and in the islands of the sea, than prevails, 
or can prevail, in the old stereotyped church- 
es, which are well content if they can only 
take care of themselves. The mind wants 
an ample supply of worthy ideas to furnish 
it with interesting, productive occupation. 
With these it must make progress and at- 
tain development ; but without them, never. 
This truth is important, not to students only, 
but to all who desire mental growth and dis- 
cipline. It is especially important for those 
who labor at occupations little friendly to 
intellectual improvement. Such persons 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 11 

should seek a remedy for the disadvantage 
of their position, by reading good books, 
which are the great store-houses of ideas 
and thoughts, and which offer a ready and 
sufficient resource. 

I but draw a legitimate inference from 
the preceding discussion, and announce the 
obvious truth of the text in another form, 
in affirming that the moral character of a 
man is as his principles ; that it is not only 
colored and modified, but formed, by his 
principles, or the theory according to which 
his life is conducted. As each separate ac- 
tion derives its quality from the motive in 
which it originates ; so the series of actions 
which constitutes the history of an individual 
is as the succession of motives from which 
they proceed, or as the moral principles, 
which in every well-balanced mind consti- 
tute the great source and regulator of 
motives. 

By a similar train of reasoning it will be 
made obvious that the mental character 
must, to a great extent, be the result of the 
theory on which the individual resolves to 
conduct his life. If the mind at any given 



12 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

time receives its impulses, its elevation, and 
its tendencies, from the particular ideas 
upon which it is employed ; its general cha- 
racter must, to a great extent, be not only 
affected, but formed, by that unbroken suc- 
cession of ideas with which it is conver- 
sant, the most influential and important of 
which are derived from those profound con- 
victions and stable purposes usually deno- 
minated the principles. Dismissing these 
too metaphysical forms of expression, into 
which I have been led in quest of clearness 
and precision, it may be stated in general 
terms, that a man's moral and intellectual 
character are as "he thinketh in his heart" 
— are as tho^e deep and earnest thoughts 
which constitute the moving forces of the 
soul, and which regulate the life. 

I think we may now regard the doctrine 
of the text as sufficiently elucidated. It 
strikes me much like a self-evident proposi- 
tion, the announcement of which brings 
with it the clearest conviction of its truth. 
It falls in with every man's experience, and 
every man's observation — with the nature 
of things, and the word of God ; and we may 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 13 

now feel at liberty to proceed with some in- 
ferences and applications of a practical 
character, adapted to the special demands 
of this occasion. I will subjoin but one 
more preliminary remark. If it shall seem 
to any that I lose sight of the differences be- 
tween moral and intellectual objects, and 
confound ideas logically and really distinct, 
I refer them to the further developments 
of this discourse, for the justification of a 
method deliberately adopted from a strong 
conviction that every just theory of intel- 
lectual training must recognize a dependence 
nearly absolute upon moral principles. 

I. It is a natural and obvious inference 
from the preceding discussion, that every 
man, and especially every educated young 
man, should furnish himself, as early as may 
be, with enlightened, stable principles of ac- 
tion. He should set out in the world with 
a well-considered and earnestly adopted 
theory of life, in obedience to whose con- 
trolling authority his ends shall be chosen 
and his eflforts prosecuted. To engage in a 
career involving consequences profoundly 
interesting in themselves, and eternal in 



14 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

their duration and influence, without settled 
principles and aims, is like setting sail upon 
the broad ocean with no specific destination ; 
and consequently with no reason for choos- 
ing one direction rather than another, but 
such as capricious gales, or more capricious 
fancies, may from time to time happen to 
supply. Nothing less than discomfiture and 
disaster could be expected from such a be- 
ginning. It is indeed among things possi- 
ble, that propitious breezes may waft the 
unpiloted bark into some desirable haven ; 
and even that the fury of the storm may 
drive the floating wreck upon some green 
or some golden shore, where reckless adven- 
ture may gather rewards never due, and 
seldom granted to anything but prudent 
foresight, and well-directed, persevering 
eflfort. He is little better than a madman, 
however, who voluntarily consents to ex- 
pose the most precious interests of his being 
to a conflict of chances in which the high- 
est perils are always imminent, and absolute 
ruin nearly unavoidable ; while success, if it 
come, as the result of fortuitous causes and 
combinations, is likely to be nearly value- 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 15 

less, because not foreseen and provided for. 
That course of life which is entered upon 
without principle, and conducted without a 
plan, cannot but be unproductive of either 
virtue, happiness, or honor. That it is not 
wholly filled up with misfortunes and dis- 
graces, and rendered to the victim of his own 
follies one unvaried scene of wretchedness, 
results from the benignant arrangements of 
divine Providence, which always protect the 
imprudent and the vicious against many of 
the consequences of their misconduct, and 
secure to all such a measure of enjoyment 
as shall make life tolerable, even to the most 
unfortunate, and awaken gratitude in the 
midst of disappointment and shame. For 
those who will not be at the trouble of sub- 
jecting themselves to the control of prin- 
ciple and duty, it is fortunate to be left 
in the walks of common, laborious life; 
where, in the absence of the higher motives 
which reason and religion supply, domestic 
instincts and urgent wants are ever at hand 
to minister their stern impulses to energetic, 
persevering activity. The great law of ne- 
cessity, which prescribes to the multitude 



16 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

their toilsome course of life, is faithful to 
exact the 'fulfillment of its duties ; but for 
those whom fortune or parental indulgence, 
or their own honorable aspirations, allow to 
choose a higher career, no such safeguard 
is provided. They must find incentives to 
action, and guaranties of success, in their 
own enlightened reason and virtuous reso- 
lution. For them to engage in the elevating 
pursuits which invite their presence, without 
the moral and mental prerequisites to success, 
is to incur necessary, unavoidable disasters. 
In the absence of established principles of 
action, their efforts will be feeble and fitful. 
The long labor of preparation will be but a 
heartless, profitless task, from which feeble 
temptations and worthless pleasures will 
ever be sufficient to draw away the waver- 
ing, irresolute disciple. Every folly which 
holds out the promise of stimulating excite- 
ment or vulgar merriment; every vice 
which has a gilded bait to offer; has its 
eye upon him as a predestined victim. 
Destitute of any sound principle of action, 
and therefore without purpose or earnest- 
ness, he floats a waif upon a sea of accidents 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 17 

— he stands idle in the market-place, a 
laborer out of work, labeled and advertised 
as a candidate for any and every adven- 
ture. I do not hesitate to announce it as 
my deliberate opinion, that most of the 
miscarriages of scholastic life are the result 
of the causes here discussed. Not a few 
young men enter upon this career without 
settled principles or purposes. They are 
conscious of no aims. They know not 
why they are in a college rather than in a 
factory or a corn-field. It is no manly, 
vigorous purpose ; no lofty aspiration ; no 
burning zeal for God's glory, or human 
w^ell-being — that has brought them here. 
Such motives dignify and consecrate the 
student's vocation ; they hallow all his 
hours and opportunities ; they exalt in- 
dustry and sobriety, and punctuality and 
order, into cardinal virtues ; they fortify 
the soul with sturdy resolution, and stir it 
with sleepless impulses ; they set it all 
a-blaze with scholarly enthusiasm, and lead 
on even ordinary men, by no means highly 
gifted, to the attainment of an intellectual 
and moral efficiency very like genius. The 

2 



18 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

pursuit of knowledge under such benignant 
auspices can never be an irksome task. It 
rather becomes a mission in fulfillment of 
which the student works on consciously 
and genially, growing every day more and 
more a man, fit to bear God's image in the 
world, and to act the part of a brother and 
a benefactor in the great suffering family, 
of which he is one. 

The other class of students, and I must 
admit that it does not everywhere lack the 
respectability of numbers, find college work, 
so far as they do it, mere drudgery. They 
taste none of the pleasures of science, and 
they reap none of the higher advantages of 
education ; for these are gained by volun- 
tary, earnest co-operation, with the sources 
of information and the appliances which 
literary institutions profess to supply. 
Something, no doubt, may be gained to 
taste and general intelligence by breathing 
a literary atmosphere, and by a half in- 
voluntary subjection to the processes of the 
study and the lecture-room ; and if it shall 
turn out that the literary idler inhales some- 
what more of the vital principle, than he 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 19 

gives out of noxious effluvia for the lungs 
of others, then there may be advantage in 
the experiment. But against these bene- 
fits, however highly they may be rated, 
there is to be taken into our account the 
offset of many fearful evils liable to be suf- 
fered and inflicted. The mind v^ithout a 
guiding principle, or recognized vocation, 
if it be not neutralized and wasted by its 
own feeble, misdirected, conflicting ten- 
dencies, will hardly escape a corrupting 
thraldom from the accidental or malicious 
influences to which it is exposed. Refusing 
its homage to the right and the true, and 
so spurning the protection of practical 
virtue, it becomes an easy prey to unsus- 
pected enemies. Other minds, as empty 
and listless as itself, or the weakest combi- 
nation of accidents, impose law upon him 
who will not choose to be his own master. 
The poor jests that fall from the idler or 
wag who sits by his side at the dinner- 
table or in the lecture-room ; or the current 
nonsense of the clique whom chance, or 
some more formal bond of union, has made 
his chosen associates ; fashion his senti- 



20 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

ments, and become chief agents in the for- 
mation of his mental and moral habits.*^ 
These appoint his aims ; and pronounce ex 
cathedra judgments more authoritative than 
university statutes, or the counsel of the 
most judicious instructors. In obedience 
to such oracles it is, that green, unfurnished 
youths, resolve that the real hinderances to 
mental improvement and to the development 
of genius are hard study and solid science ; 
and that some light reading, and vapid 
declamation — above all, the edifying dis- 
courses and flashy criticisms of the coterie — 
are able to form them great orators, and, if 
they like, great authors and statesmen. 
Let it not be imagined that these are mere 
idle fancies, which disappear with the hour 
that gives them birth. If they take the 
guise of very palpable absurdities when 
exposed in their true point of view, they 
very often present themselves upon the 
theatre of practical education as real, in- 
superable obstacles, in the way of all im- 
provement. They often render attendance 
on college terms and college exercises 

^ See Note A. 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 21 

nearly useless to the pupil, and the teach- 
er's office a laborious, vexatious nulUty. 
All good influences are lost upon such pur- 
poseless, wayward, obstinate minds. The 
accidents to which they surrender the con- 
duct of their intellect and their lives may, 
indeed, by rare good fortune, impress upon 
them some form of intelligence and virtue. 
Some higher, purer current, of the fickle 
winds to which they commit their course, 
may chance to harden into habits not 
wholly detestable some of the transient 
phases exhibited in the ever-varying phe- 
nomena of their mental progress. Still it 
would be idle to expect satisfactory results 
from causes so inadequate, and methods so 
utterly unsound. Success will be the rare 
exception — failure the rule. I repeat the 
opinion already expressed, that here is to 
be found the source of the manifold griev- 
ous disappointments which so often fall to 
the lot of so-called educated men. There 
is no reason, in the nature of things, why 
one-third of college-bred young men should 
prove unfit for the professions for which 
liberal education is designed to prepare 



V 



22 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

them, while nineteen in twenty of all who 
are apprenticed to mechanics and artisans 
turn out competent workmen. We do not 
demand that all educated men shall prove 
to be geniuses, or shall attain to the highest 
professional distinction. All, however, not 
essentially deficient in ordinary mental en- 
dowments, are capable of gaining the men- 
tal discipline which it is the business of 
schools and colleges to impart, and which 
is requisite in the functions to the fulfill- 
ment of which society calls its educated 
men. The thing most requisite to success 
in these avocations is not brilliant talent, 
but the due preparation and use of those 
average capacities which God bestows im- 
partially upon the race. These can only 
be secured by diligent, persevering study, 
pursued upon a plan and upon principle ; 
and it is because so large a class of so- 
called students have neither principle nor 
plan, that so many of them fall out by the 
way, and so many others, who manage to 
pass through college, are destined to a life 
of mortification and disappointment. 

I pass on to another remark. Since 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 23 

established principles of action are so essen- 
tial to success, we ought to use great cau- 
tion in the adoption of our principles, for 
all are not equally good. 

It must be admitted that any effective 
principle of action, not absolutely vicious, 
is better than none. Action upon low and 
adulterated motives is preferable to the in- 
tellectual stagnation which results from a 
want of strong impulses, and earnest, stable 
purpose. It is better to be driven furiously 
over rocks and shoals by Borean gales, than 
to reel and swelter, and take the plague, in 
the calms of the torrid zone. Still it is a 
matter of great moment to commence and 
prosecute our plans of life on an elevating 
and genial theory ; for in it both moral and 
mental character are deeply involved. 

Many young men choose a literary and 
professional career in preference to more 
active and laborious pursuits, from a delibe- 
rate comparison of the advantages which 
each is supposed to offer. They resolve to 
escape from the plough and the workshop, 
because they are disgusted with mere 
manual labor, and fancy that they feel 



24 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

within them the presence of mental apti- 
tudes, which, with due culture, may raise 
them to ease or aJEHuence. It cannot be 
denied that such persons have chosen for 
themselves a principle of action of great 
potency, which may stimulate to persever- 
ing industry, and even high enterprise. It 
is a motive of sufficient efficiency to insure 
stability of purpose and of action, and may, 
with great probability, lead on to thorough 
scholarship and professional eminence. It 
even offers guaranties for correct morals, 
as well as for mental improvement ; for they 
who are earnestly engaged in serious occu- 
pations, have seldom leisure or inclination 
for vice and dissipation. Self-interest, 
however, though a highly efficient, and, 
in the absence of better, a very useful 
motive, cannot be regarded a worthy 
principle of action for an intelligent mo- 
ral being. It is not good, in the long 
run, either for the intellect or the heart. 
In its higher developments it is philo- 
sophically incompatible with the active 
existence of several of the most valu- 
able sentiments and virtues that enrich and 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 25 

adorn the human character. It cannot, for 
instance, coexist with magnanimity, or 
benevolence, or generosity, or public spirit. 
When fairly enthroned as the rule of life, 
it gradually, but inevitably, loses all kind 
consideration for the v^elfare of others, or 
for any interest that cannot be made sub- 
servient to individual aggrandizement ; and 
then it is that we clearly perceive its ma- 
lignant character. Now this is the point 
to which it perpetually tends; and that 
must be pronounced a vicious principle of 
action which, however useful in special cir- 
cumstances, becomes intolerable the mo- 
ment it obtains a full development. Our 
motives of action, in order to achieve the 
utmost for character, should be such as 
gain new force and momentum with our 
progress in wisdom and virtue ; but the 
motive in question just then grows into a 
manifest, monstrous evil, fatal alike to vir- 
tue, and piety, and happiness. Its influence 
upon the intellectual character is scarcely 
less disastrous than upon the moral. The 
mind which was well-disciplined, under the 
impulses of a principle of so much energy, 



26 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

and so sagacious, soon finds itself shut in 
from all enlargement by a system, of which 
self, and not man, nor the universe, nor 
God, is the centre. The heart becomes 
hard, and the conscience seared, in their 
perpetual conflicts with the claims of 
sympathy and charity ; and this is equiva- 
lent to affirming that all the fountains of 
genial sentiment are congealed into ice, 
or indurated into stone. Insensibility to 
the interests of others is confessedly fatal 
to all true persuasive eloquence. As the 
selfish man, sooner or later, becomes an 
object of indifference or detestation to the 
world, he can never secure the reputation 
and the influence needful to move or con- 
trol other minds. He can no more be a 
poet than an orator, for he does not love or 
reverence nature, or man, or God. Nor do 
I see how he can possibly be a philosopher ; 
how he can attain to the love of truth — ex- 
cept for the gain it may bring him ; how he 
can have a heart to appreciate great dis- 
coveries in the earth or the heavens, in 
any higher spirit than that which rejoices 
in the acquisition of the precious gem acci- 



RELATIOiV TO MENTAL CULTURE. 27 

dentally brought to light in geological re- 
searches, or in the ghtter and costhness of 
the instruments with which science prose- 
cutes its inquiries. 

It would, perhaps, be unjust to liberally 
educated men, and yet more to the youthful 
student, to intimate that selfish motives 
operate upon them with peculiar force. 
He has probably surrendered himself to 
the dominion of more honorable senti- 
ments : he has chosen ambition as his 
guiding star, and spends the midnight oil 
amid visions of future renown. I believe 
that ambition does operate much more fre- 
quently and powerfully upon intelligent 
young men than self-interest ; and I gladly 
admit that it is a far more elevated and 
honorable principle of action. It emanci- 
pates the aspiring mind from a degrading 
bondage to those material interests which 
turn away its vision from all things genial 
and ennobling, and concentrate upon self 
the expansive sympathies that were meant 
for mankind. By presenting reputation 
and influence as the most desirable objects 
of pursuit, it prescribes the cultivation of 



28 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

such virtues and accomplishments as ren- 
der a man agreeable to his fellows, and so 
far provides for the interest and happiness 
of the species. Scope is thus given for 
some exercise of the charities of our nature, 
and for some degree of the virtues of pa- 
triotism and pubUc spirit; an advantage 
which raises ambition immeasurably above 
mere gross selfishness as a motive for men- 
tal culture. That rule of life, however, is 
essentially defective and faulty which pro- 
poses public favor and applause as a motive 
for the acquisition of knowledge or the cul- 
tivation of virtue. They who follow it, 
seldom become either wise or virtuous ; for 
they will soon discover that superficial 
attainments, and the semblances of virtue, 
are more easy, and not less sure, passports 
to popularity, than the realities of which 
they are the cheap substitutes and gaudy 
counterfeits. Knowledge and virtue come 
to be regarded only as means, less valuable 
and less desirable than the ends they are 
used to promote ; and they will be aban- 
doned without scruple for other expedients 
found to be of equal or greater efficacy. 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 29 

Thus degraded to the level of mere instru- 
ments, they lose their moral character, and, 
with it, their reflex power over the mind 
and the heart. It is thus that ambition, 
which, at the outset, frequently exerts a 
powerful and conservative influence upon 
the student, becomes, after no great length 
of time, a thoroughly misleading element, 
hostile alike to intellectual and moral ad- 
vancement. This is its inherent vice, 
which must operate with greater or less 
force, even in the study, and throughout 
the forming period of life. In the turmoil 
of riper years, and amid the temptations of 
a public career, its sway often becomes 
absolute, and not many are found able to 
resist its deteriorating influences. Indeed, 
ambition finds Kttle indulgence, even in 
the judgment of the world. We too in- 
cautiously, perhaps, laud an ambitious stu- 
dent ; but to apply this epithet to a man of 
mature years, to a statesman, or an aspi- 
rant for office, is equivalent to pronouncing 
him unworthy of public confidence. Am- 
bition is like self-interest in this, that it 
ministers useful impulses in the preparatory 



30 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

stages of life, and in the absence of strong 
temptations ; but it eventually undermines 
the character, and seduces both the intel- 
lect and the heart. When once the am- 
bitious scholar has become an ambitious 
politician, there is commonly an end to all 
mental and moral improvement. Tact and 
demagogueisrn answer his new aims far 
better than divine philosophy ; and he has 
entered a region of temptation too strong 
for ordinary virtue. Party arrangements 
and obligations are not long in weaving 
their meshes for the conscience, which soon 
learns submission to the code of morality 
that prefers the popular and the politic to 
the true and the right. A thousand sad 
histories, fulfilled and fulfilling among us, 
will tell, without more argument, by what 
sure, though it may be slow, gradations, the 
ingenuous, studious youth of twenty-one, is 
led on by |iiis ignis fatuus to be at forty 
an unprincipled, time-serving demagogue, 
without principle, reputation, or honorable 
aspirations. Let every young man beware 
of surrendering himself to the leading of 
unchastened ambition. Let him shun, as 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 81 

the gates of death, the arena of partisan 
strife and preferment. Let him patiently 
seek, in some honest caUing, independence 
of all parties and offices. It may be that 
intelligence and virtue will be wanted some 
day on the political stage, and he may then 
ascend it with clean hands and a good con- 
science, and with the full advantage of all 
the wisdom and reputation with which he 
has fortified his character in the innocence 
of private life. 

There is still another motive to literary 
activity, liable to none of the objections 
here referred to, which deserves more at- 
tention than it has yet received in our 
places of education. Could w^e hope to 
find a considerable number of youths so 
happily constituted that the love of learn- 
ing would prove a sufficient stimulus to 
diligent, persevering application, we should 
have discovered an incentive to action 
which the most scrupulous morality could 
hot hesitate to approve. It is a delightful 
thought, that of an ingenuous young man 
led on through the schools, and through a 
studious life, by the strong attractions of 



32 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

science, irrespective of any interested ob- 
jects or of any reward, but such as reveal 
themselves to the understanding and the 
heart, in the discovery of those great laws 
which the inscrutable wisdom of God has 
impressed upon his creation. It is not con- 
ceivable that such a principle should inter- 
fere with the highest moral development, 
or that it should fail in leading to the most 
desirable mental culture. Indeed, it ap- 
proaches both in purity and efficiency the 
Christian motive ; and but for the too nar- 
row field of its operations, we might be 
content to leave under its sole guidance 
all who will not be induced to learn the 
true philosophy of education from the great 
Teacher. 

In attempting to show that the religion 
of Christ furnishes the student with the 
only safe and adequate motive to intellect- 
ual effort, I shall take it for granted that, so 
far as moral character is concerned, the 
truth of this proposition is conceded by all 
who hear me. Enlightened infidels do not 
hesitate to acknowledge the claims of the 
gospel as the highest, purest source, of 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 33 

morals ; and none but rank, bitter enemies, 
now-a-days call this claim in question. In 
addressing myself to Christian young men 
who cheerfully recognize the excellence of 
Christianity, even while they may live in 
neglect of many of its precepts and privi- 
leges, I may safely presume that they ac- 
knowledge the Bible as the only sufficient 
standard of moral virtue ; and, therefore, the 
only safe guide in the formation of moral 
character. That the gospel also furnishes 
the only safe and sufficient motive and 
guide to intellectual culture, I shall now 
proceed to demonstrate. And here I shall 
claim nothing for religion on strictly reli- 
gious and theological grounds. I shall only 
refer to it as a system of truth and duty 
exerting, and entitled to exert, a strong and 
permanent influence upon human conduct 
and character, from its natural and philo- 
sophical, no less than from its moral, rela- 
tions to men. How, then, does Christian- 
ity bear upon the question of intellectual 
education, and minister incentives and aids 
to high mental improvement ? 

1. Its great law o/ responsibility /i^r- 
3 



34 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

nishes a motive of great and ever-living 
efficacy. 

Were it possible to lift up the veil which 
conceals from observation the secret springs 
of human action, it would be discovered 
that a deep conviction of accountability to 
God is the most pervading and powerful of 
these occult agencies. In the irreligious, 
this principle chiefly operates in the re- 
straints which it imposes upon their bad 
dispositions ; and to it we must chiefly re- 
fer the wide difference between the actual 
conduct and character of men, and that 
profounder depravity and overflowing pro- 
fligacy which would prevail in the absence 
of all sense of moral and religious obliga- 
tion. It is, however, upon pious minds 
that this principle operates with its fullest 
force. In them every act and enterprise 
is subordinated to this universal lav/. 
'' Lord, what wilt thou have me to do ?'*' 
is the bm'den of every prayer. They '' la- 
bor to be approved unto God ;'' and they 
are only satisfied with their own perform- 
ances in proportion as all things have been 
done with a " single eye." They must 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 35 

"eat and drink to the glory of God/' His 
claims to homage extend to every " word " 
and " act ;" and they charge themselves to 
remember that they are to give account 
for all ''the deeds done in the body." 
Such a conviction of responsibility, in pro- 
portion as it is honestly entertained and 
obeyed, becomes the great law of life ; and 
impresses with its potency, and tinges with 
its hues, every spring of action and every 
phase of character. 

It will be admitted, I am sure, that this 
great Christian motive presses upon none 
with more urgency, or with an authority 
more imperative and sacred, than upon the 
young man led by his own inclinations, and 
allowed by providential circumstances to 
devote his early years to mental culture. 
He is engaged in elevating and purifying 
that part of his nature which constitutes 
him a man and a child of eternity — for which 
God manifests his care in all the arrange- 
ments of his grace, and for which Christ 
died on the cross. He is engaged in fitting 
for high uses the instrument by which alone 
he can honor God or enjoy him, or promote 



36 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

the happiness of his fellow-creatures. If 
there is done on this earth a work of some 
importance and dignity, the culture of the 
immortal mind is such a work. To perform 
this work well, to make the most of these 
priceless opportunities, is obviously a sacred 
duty. The student occupies a high and 
holy trust. By diligence and fidelity in his 
work, he augments for ever his own powers 
of happiness and usefulness. He augments 
the means of happiness intrusted to him for 
human society. He augments his own ca- 
pacity for knowing, enjoying, and honoring 
God. Shall it be thought a slight offense 
to prove false to such obligations ? Shall 
the man who perverts influence, or squan- 
ders wealth, or violates a public trust, be 
deemed culpable, and is he innocent who 
robs himself, and society, and God, of talents 
put in his hands not to be buried or wasted, 
but to be improved to the utmost ? Surely, 
if God will judge the world in righteousness, 
and with a rigorous impartiality demand 
his own, with usury, from every delinquent, 
the inquisition will press hard upon those 
who are accused of wasting the most pre- 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 37 

cious of their Lord's goods — the immortal 
mind, made to appreciate his character and 
promote his glory. Upon every student 
rests this fearful responsibility ; and every 
Christian student will recognize and respect 
it with a degree of solemn earnestness pro- 
portioned to his intelligence and piety. He 
will feel that "he is not his own'' — that his 
talents and opportunities are only his to im- 
prove and employ conscientiously, and to 
account for in the last day. Under such 
convictions he can neither idle nor trifle. 
He will find in them a sleepless, faithful moni- 
tor, to rebuke away indolence and apathy; 
to whisper hope and heroism into his faint- 
ing spirit; to prescribe temperance in afl 
things ; to endow his hours with such a 
sanctity that it were sacrilege to waste them ; 
to give law to his resting, his rising, and his 
recreation ; to invoke his profounder re- 
spect for statutes and usages established for 
the maintenance of needful order, and for 
the protection against all intrusion of time 
consecrated to study. Such is the natural 
influence, and the actual, so far as con- 
science has fair play, which religion exerts 



38 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

over intellectual improvement. I grieve to 
admit that not a fev^ nominally Christian 
students are neither industrious nor law- 
abiding ; though idle and disorderly are epi- 
thets as incongruous to their holy profes- 
sion, as profane and intemperate. It is also 
saddening to the heart to observe the course 
of too many Christian young men, after they 
have passed the earlier stages of literary 
preparation. They cease to be students as 
soon as they are fairly launched upon the 
voyage of life. They are at the zenith of 
their intellectual greatness at thirty or thirty- 
five. A modicum of professional lore, a poor 
pittance of theology, a petty curriculum of 
pulpit preparation, is all they ever add to 
the measure of attainment v^ith which they 
enter upon active life. Progress from hence- 
forth there is none, except in the wrong di- 
rection. The starved intellect dwindles for 
want of fresh supplies of its natural aliment ; 
imagination falters and grows dim, disgust- 
ed with its own worn-out imagery; dis- 
course becomes flat and unprofitable, with- 
out freshness or point ; and at fifty you have 
a man physically strong, but intellectually 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 39 

exhausted, incapable of doing anything pleas- 
ant or profitable to God or man. Every 
such sad example implies gross recreancy to 
Christian obligations. Those who keep the 
commandment, " add to their virtue know- 
ledge ;" they " grow in grace and in the 
knowledge of Christ ;" and their intellectual 
pathway shines brighter and brighter unto 
the perfect day.* 

2. Responsibility to God is the most power- 
ful of all motives to intellectual exertion, and 
it operates upon every conscientious stu- 
dent with a force proportioned to his intel- 
ligence and piety. Religion supplies other 
influences auxiliary to this, which act upon 
and through some of the strongest principles 
of our mental and moral constitution. It is 
an incurable fault of lower motives that 
they operate unsteadily, and cease, for the 
most part, to exert any salutary, sufficient 
authority, at periods of life when the mind 
is yet vigorous and susceptible of large and 
rapid progress. Self-interest, as we have 
seen, soon contracts the intellect and har- 
dens the heart — fatal checks upon progress, 
*^ See Note B. 



40 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

deadly foes to all excellence. Ambition 
puts its votaries upon other expedients than 
literary efforts for the attainment of success. 
Disappointment, too, and disgust, with which 
ambition must generally lay its account, 
impair and often destroy its efficiency, as a 
motive to intellectual activity, when the 
career of honorable enterprise has only 
commenced. Many a gallant spirit, urged 
on its course by these unchastened impul- 
ses, have we seen stranded and motionless 
amid the sad wreck of high hopes, long ere 
his sun had reached its meridian. Now 
it is the special advantage of the Christian 
motive, that it acts with a steady, and even 
increasing, force, to the end of life. No dis- 
appointment can chill its energy, for that 
flows forth upon the soul from inexhaustible 
perennial sources. 

It is also a consideration full of the migh- 
tiest impulses, that intellectual growth and 
amelioration, like moral, are achieved for 
eternal duration. The labor requisite for 
acquisition and discipline, is lightened and 
sweetened by the reflection that it is to qua- 
lify an immortal spirit the better to perform its 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 41 

functions ; more perfectly to understand, and 
more keenly to enjoy, all that God shall reveal 
or enjoin through the long annals of an end- 
less life. The mind does not die ; and he who 
sends it onward upon its sublime career, 
enlarged and trained by wholesome disci- 
pline, and richly furnished with the know- 
ledge of imperishable truths, " lays up trea- 
sure where neither moth nor rust corrupt.^* 
Nothing in religion or enlightened philosophy 
will justify the fear that the high intellectual 
attributes, with which the redeemed soul 
enters heaven, may not find worthy and 
significant employment there. The pious 
student, then, may exultingly write down for 
his motto, "I STUDY for eternity;'" and 
in so sublime a sentiment will he find un- 
failing encouragement to patient industry 
and persevering labor. 

3. In nothing perhaps is the great supe- 
riority of the Christian, over all other mo- 
tives, more manifest than in the uniform 
and powerful co-operation which it secures 
of the emotional with the intellectual forces 
of the mind. All work is briskly done when 
the heart is in it. Eminently true is this 



42 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

of intellectual labor ; and from the school- 
boy under the usher's rod, to the grave phi- 
losopher, those mental tasks which awaken 
a lively interest, and are performed with 
satisfaction, are easily and rapidly achieved. 
Whatever is attempted under the high sanc- 
tions of Christian obligation, possesses this 
advantage in an eminent degree. It is done 
to please God, and to glorify his name. It 
affords, therefore, to the pious spirit, an op- 
portunity, ever eagerly embraced, for dis- 
charging a debt of gratitude, and offering 
testimonials of duty and loyalty. The heart 
at once warms to such an enterprise, and 
all the powers of the soul gladly co-operate 
in a work of an import so high. The Chris- 
tian scholar is thus enabled to be always in 
earnest. His love and fidelity to God, and 
his gratitude to Christ, are concerned in the 
most effective discharge of this important 
class of duties, and his prayers and sacra- 
ments are not felt to be more obligatory 
upon him, than the functions of the study 
and the lecture-room. He learns to prose- 
cute every science, and fulfill every scho- 
lastic engagement, under the supervision of 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 43 

an all-seeing and never-sleeping Eye. How 
feeble and inconstant are all the motives 
which selfishness and ambition can furnish, 
in comparison with those which the love of 
God, and conscious amenabihty to him, are 
able to awaken in the pious heart ! Let no 
one hastily conclude that this is a merely 
theoretical view of the subject, of no appli- 
cation to the matter in hand. On the con- 
trary, it is a view applicable to every Chris- 
tian scholar, and constitutes the actual 
motive of his conduct, in so far as he has 
any claim to the name of ChrisJ:ian. He 
studies as he would toil in any other sphere — 
as, called with a higher vocation, he would 
preach the gospel, or go upon a mission to 
the heathen — that he may glorify God in the 
performance of the duties providentially as- 
signed him. They know little of the deep 
sentiments and holy aspirations of pious 
young men in our colleges, who doubt 
whether they pursue their self-denying ca- 
reer, and struggle with narrow means, and 
often with feeble health, under the lofty im- 
pulses which religion inspires. With very 
many of them, these, I am sure, constitute 



44 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

the motive and the solace of their toils ; and 
I will not hesitate to avow that the example 
of such young men, toiling on for a series 
of years, amidst discouragements of many 
kinds, that they may by and by be qualified 
for usefulness in the Master's vineyard, has 
often proved most instructive and sustain- 
ing to me, and has admonished me to stand 
patiently and bravely in my lot, albeit ready 
to faint under the pressure of burdens dis- 
proportioned to my strength. 

4. A similar augmentation of spiritual 
forces ccyfnes in upon the pious student 
from another quarter. Benevolence, and an 
ardent desire to do good to mankind, take 
the place of the narrow selfishness which, 
under less favorable conditions, constitutes 
the chief incentive to exertion. We know 
to what heights of self-sacrificing effort and 
virtue philanthropy has been able to elevate 
the great benefactors of mankind ; through 
what dangers, and over what obstacles, it 
has borne them onward to their angelic 
achievements. This ambition to mitigate 
the woes, and augment the happiness, of 
others, pours all its generous, powerful im- 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 45 

pulses, into the bosom of many a pious stu- 
dent, and becomes the sleepless monitor of 
his waking, working hours. As the love of 
God enlists all the energies and stabilities 
of Christian principle on the side of earnest, 
persevering industry ; love to man awakens 
and presses into the same service all the 
strong sympathies of our humanity. These 
are confessedly the most powerful of all the 
agencies that go to influence the conduct, 
or modify the character, of men. They 
minister amazing energy to the mind. They 
rouse every dormant power into action. 
They arm the soul with preternatural efR- 
ciency. They make the mind inventive, 
vigilant, and daring. Faith, hope, and cha- 
rity, have each their functions to fulfill in 
every department of Christian action, and 
nowhere else more than in the student's 
career ; but the greatest of these is charity — 
the most animating, the most powerful, the 
most enduring, of all the motives that minis- 
ter earnestness and encouragement to the 
Christian student. 

5. It will hardly be deemed a diversion 
from this strain of argument, to remark upon 



46 . CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

the elevating, plastic influence, of prosecut- 
ing a protracted literary course at the form- 
ing period of life, under these lofty, pure, and 
disinterested motives. You cannot imagine 
any other course so well calculated to form 
large-minded, generous, upright men. Who- 
ever makes the will of God, the rule and 
glory of God, and the welfare of men, the 
chief objects of his intellectual efforts, 
through a series of years, subjects his mind, 
as well as his heart, to a meliorating process 
of unparalleled efficacy. Nothing base, or 
degrading, or selfish, should be expected to 
survive such a course of discipline ; and it 
would be difficult to conceive of any virtue 
fitted to adorn or strengthen the character, 
which should not find in it precisely the 
conditions most favorable to vigorous, am- 
ple development. 

It is also material to remark, that such a 
scholastic career tends powerfully to supply 
the great desideratum in educated men — the 
harmony of the mind and the heart, the joint 
working of strong intellect and strong feel- 
ing — upon which all great mental efficiency 
and all true eloquence depend, and without 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 47 

which the scholar can never hope to wield 
a great and permanent influence over the 
most precious interests of man and society. 
The arts of the rhetorician, however dili- 
gently plied, are all at fault here. Rules 
for managing the voice, or the eye, or the 
hands, and other physical auxiliaries to per= 
suasion and oratory, can but kindle a cold, 
lusterless fire, which shall be as the crack- 
ling of thorns; while a well-endowed nature, 
diligently trained by education, and put in 
harmony with God and itself by religion, 
shall be able to pour forth, spontaneously, 
a tide of persuasive eloquence, whenever in- 
voked by a worthy occasion. This, as is 
well known, is the perfect ideal held up by 
the rhetoricians to aspirants after forensic 
reputation ; but it mostly escapes them that 
it is one of those priceless gifts which can- 
not be won by unsanctified labor, but, in a 
very important sense, cometh down from 
the Father of lights. 

6. I will add, that education, prosecuted 
under the auspices of religion, enjoys a 
great facility, in the freedom of its subjects, 
from the low tastes, bad passions, and vi- 



48 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

cious habits, which constitute chief obsta- 
cles to proficiency in learning. These are 
utterly incompatible with sincere piety, and 
cannot coexist with it ; while any Christian 
profession, not wholly reckless of reputation 
and consistency, must avoid the grosser and 
more degrading forms of immorality. Every 
degree of religious principle and restraint, 
therefore, contributes a highly important 
influence toward the success of educational 
efforts ; while deep and ardent piety, wel- 
comed as the guide in literary pursuits, 
conducts to degrees of excellence and suc- 
cess, unattainable on lower principles. 

My inferences from this protracted dis- 
cussion must be few and brief. 

1. Let every young man, especially let 
every educated young man, pause at the 
commencement of his career, till he tho- 
roughly comprehends the importance of set- 
ting out with a proper theory of life. Let 
him " arise and shake himself." Let him 
spurn away from him, for one holy hour, 
the blandishments of ease and pleasure. Let 
him burst from the bondage of all unmanly, 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 49 

unscholarly habits, like a brave, high-toned 
spirit, resolved to be his own master, and 
to rule himself well. He should ascend to 
some lofty mount of vision, some Pisgah, 
from whose summit the whole land "that 
remaineth to be possessed '' shall be clearly 
visible to his earnest, honest gaze. Scorn- 
ing to be hoodwinked and cheated by mere 
illusions, let him penetrate into the heart and 
reality of his whole destiny ; doing impartial 
justice to the claims and dignity of the 
mind, as well as the body — of the distant and 
the future, no less than of the near and the 
present. With eternity and God before his 
eyes, and some reasonable, decent regard 
for his own well-being, let him come up to 
the great choice that, once for all, he must 
make for himself: "If the Lord be God, 
follow him ; if Baal, then follow him.'' Let 
him remember that the principle which 
he adopts becomes henceforward a living, 
molding influence. It will enter and dwell 
in the depths of his nature — a well of water 
springing up and overflowing the soul, im- 
parting to it, through the long ages of the 
future, its own properties and hues. Re- 

4 



'50 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

member, young man, you are selecting a 
companion for the voyage of your entire 
existence, whose manners, habits, and sen- 
timents, so close and long an intimacy will 
make your own. You are determining 
what meat your soul shall be nurtured upon ; 
what shall be the complexion of your future 
being. In forming a library, you would 
have good, and not bad, silly, corrupting 
books. In choosing a teacher, or a place of 
education, you would avoid a driveler, and 
require the protection of discipline and good 
order. Your physician must not be a 
quack, nor a pretender. You are ambi- 
tious to give your adhesion to true and ap- 
proved, not to antiquated and exploded, 
systems of philosophy. In choosing your 
principles of action, and subjecting your 
mind to influences which must form its cha- 
racter and control its destiny, you consent 
to receive into your bosom an agency more 
potent than books, or teachers, or schools ; 
more efficient than the physician's most 
heroic remedies; more authoritative than 
all the sects of philosophers. You are thus 
called upon to assert the highest privilege, 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 51 

and perform the highest function, of a free, 
redeemed, heaven-born spirit. Show that 
you are worthy of the sacred trust which 
God, in his providence, confers upon you — 
the office of taking care of yourself. 

2. Having deliberately adopted a right 
principle of action, reverence and obey it. 
Make it the law of your life, from which no 
temptation, or interest, or accident, shall ever 
seduce you to swerve. It is an emanation 
from the divine Wisdom fallen upon you, as 
a lamp for your feet. It is the sum and 
highest expression of all genial philosophies. 
Come what will — ruat coelum, "though 
heaven and earth pass away '' — resolve that 
no jot or tittle of this law shall be marred, 
or dishonored, or shorn of its authority. It 
shall be your charmed talisman, before which 
evil spirits will cry out in despair, or be 
smitten dumb with terror. It shall be your 
passport to excellence, and reputation, and 
power, and honest fame, at the presentation 
of which barred gates will open before you 
to all choice and precious things. A con- 
scientious, early, and absolute surrender, of 
the life to the guidance of duty, brings into 



52 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

the mind a power far more valuable than 
would be the acquisition of new faculties : 
it quadruples the efficiency of the old. It is 
better than genius or eloquence, and is often 
a good substitute for them. It simplifies all 
the movements of life. It cuts short a thou- 
sand struggles with temptation and pas- 
sion. It is a thread of gold in the hands 
of inexperienced youth and care-worn man- 
hood, to conduct the willing and obedient 
through the dark, pathless labyrinth, of this 
world. Ordinary capacity trained and ope- 
rating under this influence, in the end, out- 
shines and outstrips the best parts without 
it. Not a class graduates in this, or any 
other college, which cannot furnish living 
illustrations of this truth. So profound is 
my conviction on this point, that I do not 
hesitate to proclaim it as the true, infallible 
way to success. Granted a subject for our 
experiment, not mentally halt, or maimed, 
or blind, in the possession of merely com- 
mon faculties ; and a liberal education, pro- 
secuted under the auspices of pure, high 
principles, shall make him every whit a man, 
fit for any profession or avocation to which 



KELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 53 

society calls her intelligent, cultivated sons. 
I must subjoin the additional remark, that 
nothing begets such utter despair of success 
in teaching, no matter what the mental ca- 
pacity, as indifference to moral and con- 
scientious obligations. There is really no 
hope for a young man who will not listen to 
the voice of duty. He has fallen a prey to 
a mortal disease, for which no human 
skill can provide a remedy. The voice of 
duty is the voice of God — -an inborn, heaven- 
sent guide. Not to obey it is to revolt against 
our own constitution ; it is as if one should 
refuse to give heed to the intimations of his 
senses ; his eyes, his ears, or his touch — and 
will, as certainly, and by as dire a philo- 
sophical necessity, bring upon him hopeless, 
irretrievable misfortune. When this men- 
tal disease is once established, I could wish 
never to see its victim enter the doors of a 
college, or armed with education, to be no 
ordinary scourge to himself and society. 
Let such a one be consigned to some nar- 
row sphere of laborious life, where there is 
least room to encounter temptation, or ex- 
ert influ^ice> and where an urgent demand 



54 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

for strenuous, incessant toil, may counteract 
and subdue more harmful tendencies. 

3. I shall conclude with a very simple 
practical direction. Always be ready to 
avow your principles of action. Scorn con- 
cealment. Put out your true colors to the 
gaze of men and angels. There is a false 
prudence, a mock modesty, which inculcates 
the opposite method. It discourages con- 
fession, as savoring of ostentation, and would 
have us leave the world to infer the exist- 
ence of virtuous principle from our conduct. 
In most instances this is but a paltroon's ex- 
pedient to avoid responsibility, and save a 
convenient position for treachery or evasion. 
It is well and safe to stand committed to the 
right, that the world may know, in advance, 
where you will be found in any day of trial ; 
and it is a reflection upon a good man's in- 
telligence or integrity, to have his opinions 
and principles for ever unsettled, or in doubt. 
Society has a right to know what it may 
expect from him ; and justly suspects him of 
interested and dishonest aims, when he 
chooses to remain undecided and uncom- 
mitted till popular suffrage has announced 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 55 

the safe way. Educated men are the na- 
tural sources and guides of popular opinion ; 
and they are bound to stand forth boldly, to 
battle with prejudice and breast the inun- 
dation of passion, though at some risk of 
being swept away by its fury. The princi- 
ples of the educated, active, influential men, 
of every community, generally become its 
public sentiment. This living embodiment 
and expression of reason, truth, and right- 
eousness, acts upon the multitude with vast- 
ly more directness and efficiency than 
books of morals and religion ; and as it con- 
stitutes the most effectual method for the 
formation and vigorous maintenance of a 
sound public sentiment, so it is chiefly re- 
lied upon for that function. On this account 
it was that the laws of Athens held that 
citizen an enemy to the state who remain- 
ed a neutral in any important crisis or ques- 
tion of general interest. The Redeemer of 
the world has given to this equitable prin- 
ciple the sanction of religion, and it is 
only they who confess him before men, 
whom he will confess before the angels in 
heaven. 



56 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

Let every one who would not become a 
mere puppet and time-server, beware of 
feeling more solicitude for promotion than 
he does for his principles. If they are to 
be put down, it is a misfortune and a snare 
to rise ; and he should blush, and suspect 
himself a knave, who is conscious of 
grudging the sacrifice which it may cost 
him to be an honest man. No valuable 
ends, besides those of selfish or profligate 
ambition, can ever be secured by such dis- 
honorable successes ; and any but a weak 
or unscrupulous man will prefer to bide his 
time, and wait for more auspicious days, 
when God, whose attributes ever side with 
the right, will pluck its drowned honors 
from the deep, and make the conscientious 
and the brave sharers in its triumphs. 
Whoever covets promotion while his prin- 
ciples are under the ban, must fall back 
upon the expedients and resources of party, 
which is always framed and held together 
by compromises in which principle is sacri- 
ficed to policy. Into this turbid maelstrom, 
from which virtue and conscience never 
come forth without a stain, good, but am- 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 57 

bitious men, of facile morality and feeble 
purposes, are ever ready to plunge. 

As a good man is ever bound to mani- 
fest his principles in full view of the world ; 
so should he, with a yet intenser solicitude, 
strive to keep them boldly and vividly ex- 
pressed to his own mind. He should ac- 
custom himself to gaze upon them with 
profound, and even awful, respect. His 
soul should be pervaded by a deep abiding 
sense of their importance, their sanctity, 
and their authority. Both the understand- 
ing and the heart need maintain the most 
intimate and conscious connection with the 
pure, sacred springs, from which they derive 
their light and inspiration. In the great 
questions of humanity, morals, and religion, 
with which these latter days are rife, the 
Christian scholar should even hesitate to 
yield himself to the guidance of his most 
virtuous habits, or to the most deliberate 
and unsuspected of his by-gone conclusions, 
or to the conservative traditions which he 
may have imbibed from his converse with 
good books and wise men. In matters of 
slight import and perpetual recurrence. 



58 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

these are sufficient safeguards against 
erroneous opinion or vicious action, but 
not in the great struggle for moral and 
social meliorations in which the educated 
men of this age are called to engage. He 
who would command the best resources 
for this high enterprise, must penetrate 
deeper than habit, or opinion, or authority. 
He must live in hourlv contact, and con- 
scious, loving communion, with the prin- 
ciples of truth, righteousness, and mercy, 
that are within him. He must draw from 
the deep sources of all moral and intellect- 
ual power, and require of every cause, 
which asks sympathy and co-operation, 
that it obtain afresh the approval of his 
reason and his conscience. His heart 
must beat, his bosom heave, and his eye 
flash, only at the bidding of the great, 
deep, holy principles, which his own stren- 
uous efforts, and the grace of God, have 
imbedded in his nature to minister light to 
his soul, and vigor to his arm, and fire to 
his eloquence. In the dogmas of such a 
philosophy must the philanthropist and the 
Christian seek for strength. Here is the 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 59 

inexhaustible source of the only species of 
power of which a good man may be inno- 
cently ambitious. 

Your thoughts, young gentlemen, have 
all along outrun my speculations. From 
the first you anticipated my conclusions. 
Remote as was our starting-point ; abstract 
and speculative as is our argument; we 
find ourselves conducted to the true source 
of wisdom and virtue. Behold, in the cross 
of Christ, the only sure guaranty for intel- 
lectual excellence and success ! Does the 
student need a lofty, omnipotent, undying 
motive, to sustain him in his long struggle 
with labor, disappointment, and temptation ; 
with the world's unfriendliness, and his 
own manifold infirmities ? Such a motive 
he finds in the gospel, and nowhere else. 
Are noble sentiments, strong, deep sympa- 
thies, and pure, powerful feelings, indispen- 
sable agents in the highest intellectual per- 
formances ? They are supplied in the 
principles and experiences of that religion 
which inculcates, as the sum of all right- 
eousness, perfect devotion and perfect 
benevolence — that " we love the Lord our 



60 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

\ 

God with all the heart, and our neighbor 
as ourselves/' Are the tastes to be ele- 
vated, the appetites subdued, and the pas- 
sions controlled, in order to secure to the 
mind's operations freedom from all impedi- 
ments and distracting influences ? This 
miracle, too, the gospel can accomplish. 
It is profitable for all things. " Love, joy, 
peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, 
faith, meekness, temperance,'' are its legiti- 
mate fruits. " They that are Christ's, have 
crucified the flesh, with the affections and 
lusts." They are endowed with "whatso- 
ever things are honest, and lovely, and of 
good report." 

I have brought you to the cross, my 
friends, and I leave you there. O be con- 
tent to receive your illumination from this, 
the great central light of the universe ! 
Hence — if you will cultivate the loftiest am- 
bition, and secure the best attainments — ■ 
hence draw your inspiration. Hither come 
for power and for joy; hither bring all 
your honors and successes, and consecrate 
them " to Him who hath loved us, and 
washed us from our sins in his own blood." 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 61 

Write the name of Christ upon your ban- 
ner ; exalt the cross high above all idols : 
''In hoc signo vinces." Be 

" Siloa's brook, that flow'd 
Fast by the oracles of God," 

your Castalia. 

To such good auspices it is my privilege 
once more affectionately to commend you ; 
and may the grace of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, and the love of God, and the com- 
munion of the Holy Ghost, be with you, 
now and ever. Amen, 



APPENDIX. 



Note A. — Pasfe 20 



o 



The literary fraternities, of late so greatly 
multiplied in our colleges, exert a very im- 
portant influence upon the formation of 
both mental and moral character. They 
have gradually introduced into these insti- 
tutions a new element, very worthy of at- 
tention, whether considered in connection 
with the maintenance of sound discipline 
and good order, or with literary improve- 
ment. Twenty years ago the students of 
a college usually formed two associations, 
for the purpose of mutual improvement in 
composition and oratory. Two hours in 
some afternoon or evening of each week 
were set apart by the authority, or with 
the consent of the faculty, for these exer- 
cises ; which were conducted sometimes 
secretly, but more commonly with some 
degree of publicity, under such rules and 



64 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

regulations as were agreed upon for the 
orderly transaction of business. These 
societies, though liable to abuses, often 
contributed in a considerable degree to 
the improvement of the student. Some 
skill and facility in extemporaneous speak- 
ing were acquired — for w^iich the ordinary 
routine of college life affords less favorable 
opportunities. A spirit of inquiry and emu- 
lation was awakened ; information was eli- 
cited; the timid were encouraged to take 
part in exercises prescribed with their con- 
sent, and presided over by their associates ; 
and the general freedom and wide scope, 
as well as the method, of the discussion, 
were calculated to introduce into the scho- 
lastic arena something of the earnestness 
and reality of the actual business of life, 
for which it constituted, to some extent, a 
useful preparation. The drawbacks upon 
these benefits were often party spirit, 
rivalries, jealousies, and suspicions ; a loose 
and vapid style of speaking and writing, 
contracted in the absence of proper in- 
struction and judicious criticism ; and 
sometimes an undervaluing of the pre- 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 65 

scribed studies and duties which constitute 
the student's proper business. 

In addition to the two or three asso- 
ciations, which usually embraced the whole 
body of students, we now have from five or 
six to a dozen secret societies, aiming at 
similar objects with the old fraternities, and 
securing them in various degrees. Some 
special benefits are probably gained by this 
minute subdivision, in the closer intimacies 
and by the freer play of confidence and 
sympathy which it allows. 

Of the disadvantages which may grow 
out of this innovation I only speak theo- 
retically, as the excellent tone of moral 
sentiment which has usually prevailed in 
the Wesleyan University is calculated to 
counteract any unfavorable tendencies in 
the casual associations of the students. 
The additional expenditure of money and 
time is a practical and obvious objection 
of considerable w^eight, though slight in 
comparison with any injurious influences 
on mental and moral culture which may 
possibly result from the cause under con- 
sideration. The inconsiderable numbers of 

5 



66 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

which these societies, now so greatly mul- 
tiphed, must consist, would seem to be less 
favorable to improvement than larger asso- 
ciations, from lack of stimulus, and the want 
of ^n audience ; from the narrow sphere 
of comparison ; and from the little variety 
of talent and attainment presented, whether 
to awaken emulation or to supply models. 
It is an easy achievement to shine and win 
applause in a circle of half a dozen students 
drawn together, it may be, by the common 
bond of mediocrity in mind and scholar- 
ship; while intellectual exhibitions in the 
presence of fifty or a hundred intelligent 
young men, have another sort of ordeal to 
pass. In the larger association we should 
always expect some examples of fine taste, 
sound reasoning, and good speaking, well 
calculated to awaken and guide a manly 
ambition to excel. The closer intimacy, 
and stronger ties, of the smaller fraternities, 
must also tend to impair the strength, or 
prevent the existence of the esprit dii corps 
of the class and the institution, which con- 
stitutes one of the most dehghtful, enduring, 
and valuable, satisfactions and reminiscences 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 67 

of college life. It will be found, I think, 
except under the most favorable circum- 
stances, that the multiplication of these 
fraternities tends to excite groundless sus- 
picions ; to alienate friends, and prevent 
the formation of friendships between con- 
genial minds. Even religious ties and sym- 
pathies are not always able to resist an 
influence which may sometimes degrade 
literary associations into the bigotry, sel- 
fishness, and pettiness of a clique. In a 
state of morals and sentiments less favor- 
able than that wdth which I have the 
good fortune to be most conversant, 
the unreasonable and eager strife of 
small associations might produce great 
difficulties in the government of a literary 
institution. I am, however, bound in jus- 
tice to add, that no such evils have fallen un- 
der my notice ; and that instances have come 
to my knowledge in which the right feeling 
and self-respect of the fraternity have ren- 
dered valuable aid to the cause of good 
order, and done much to restrain an erring 
member from indolence, vice, and dishonor. 
Not to make any further use of the 



68 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

foregoing suggestions, they should inspire 
the student with great caution in his se- 
lection among the various societies which 
invite him to their fellowship on his en- 
trance upon college life. He should, at 
least, take time to consider, and become 
acquainted. He should be cautious that 
he does not commit the keeping of his com- 
fort, his scholarship, his principles, his man- 
ners and morals, to associaties whose bond 
of union may be their community of idle 
habits, vulgar tastes, and conversation ; of 
low scholarship, and loose or irreligious prin- 
ciples ; and a common aversion to certain 
laborious studies and duties prescribed in 
the college course. The societies them- 
selves ought to be ever on their guard 
against the dangers and abuses to which, 
however outweighed by advantages, they 
are unavoidably exposed ; to maintain a 
spirit of generous, honorable, not of petty, 
suspicious rivalry, toward their confrater- 
nities. They should watch over the con- 
duct of their members with brotherly kind- 
ness and solicitude, and seek to promote in 
them scholarly, gentlemanly, and manly, 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 69 

habits and aspirations. It should ever be 
a first principle with them to prosecute 
their laudable objects in strict subordina- 
tion to their higher duties as members of a 
public institution, and in a frank and in- 
genuous, and honorable spirit, toward its 
administration and government. Even 
those slight infractions of law and order 
which may be deemed venial in an inexpe- 
rienced individual, ought to be esteemed 
disgraceful in a society of intelligent young 
gentlemen, which is presumed to be ani- 
mated and guided by the combined dis- 
cretion, and honor, and conscience, of all 
its members. Associations of students, 
judiciously conducted, in accordance with 
the principles here suggested — devoting 
themselves, not to trivial, but to significant, 
earnest,, manly discussions and inquiries ; 
always kept in harmony with the higher 
duties and objects of college life; and, I 
will add, never allowed to interfere with 
due attention to the public societies, or to 
introduce into them any of the petty rival- 
ries of the minor fraternities — may become 
very useful aids to intellectual culture. 



70 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 



Note B.— Page 39. 

The limits of a single discourse would only 
allow a passing allusion to the subject of 
this paragraph ; though its intrinsic import- 
ance might well claim a far more extended 
consideration. The evil referred to is the 
besetting sin of educated men in the United 
States ; which, so far as I have enjoyed op- 
portunities of observation, gives them a bad 
distinction in comparison with those of 
other countries. With regard to the great 
body of our graduates it may be affirmed, 
without qualification, that they make no 
advancement in classical and scientific 
knowledge after leaving college. The 
two or three years usually devoted to 
professional studies, carry forward the 
work of mental discipline with some good 
effect ; but, upon their entrance into active 
life, three-fourths of our scholars bid a final 
adieu to both literature and science, as if 
these were only fit for school-boys, and of 
no further use for mental culture, for grace- 
ful accomplishment or elegant recreation. 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 71 

We have an increasing, though still a very- 
small, class of professionally literary men- 
authors, editors, philosophers, &c. — who 
make letters and science their business. 
We may add to these, the professors and 
teachers in our leading educational esta- 
blishments ; and now and then a clergyman 
or physician, chiefly of the younger class : 
the residue of our liberally educated 
men not only make no advancement in 
scholastic attainments, but are actually re- 
trograding to a point where a page of 
Tacitus, or a proposition in Euclid, be- 
comes to them the profoundest of myste- 
ries. Even in professional learning, little 
progress is usually made beyond the de- 
mand of an imperative necessity ; and it is 
only in the hands of a few that medicine, 
law, or theology, becomes a really liberal 
profession. It seems doubtful whether any 
decided improvement will very soon be 
achieved. Growth in civilization, and the 
keener competition and more minute and 
better-defined division of labor, which 
must resuh from a dense population, and 
the prevalence of a higher general intelli- 



72 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

gence, will gradually create and enforce a 
demand for better literary qualifications. 
Meantime, the strong inducements to ac- 
tive business life — the temptations of 
trade, of speculation, and other methods 
of money-making — will continue to seduce 
our educated men to desert or neglect their 
proper sphere. Above all, the bottomless 
pit of politics will still swallow up its heca- 
tombs of noble victims. For all this there 
is really no remedy in our present state of 
society; and it only remains for our lite- 
rary institutions to use all diligence in re- 
pairing the waste. More than ever is it 
incumber upon them to elevate the stand- 
ard of education, and furnish our rising 
scholars with the greatest practicable 
amount of good cultivation; since it is 
quite certain, with regard to the most of 
them, that they will cease from all literary 
improvement as soon as they become their 
own teachers. 

So far as these strictures are applicable 
to Christian scholars, the evil ought to find 
its cure in their conscientiousness, and their 
zeal to obtain the highest qualifications for 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 73 

usefulness. To these moral inlfluences are 
we indebted for a majority of the examples 
of Hterary industry and excellence that still 
exist among us. A considerable number 
of clergymen, especially, retain their habits 
of careful study and mental activity to ad- 
vanced age. It must be confessed, how- 
ever, that, as a class, they are far from 
guiltless of the shortcomings on which we 
have ventured to comment. 

There is one form of this grievous error 
to which an interesting class of our gra- 
duates are specially exposed, and which 
merits, on that account, a passing notice. 
I refer to preachers and candidates for the 
ministry, of whom our graduating classes 
annually furnish the church with an in- 
creasing number. A large majority of 
these become itinerant ministers, a pecu- 
liarity in their mode of life which is liable 
to exert a special influence upon intellect- 
ual character. The frequent changes in- 
volved in this system of ministerial labor, 
though by no means incompatible with the 
highest intellectual attainments, and con- 
fessedly very favorable to a zealous and 



74 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

effective discharge of the most important 
ministerial dutieSj offer to those who are 
wilhng to fall into such a snare, some pecu- 
liar temptations to intellectual sloth. The 
custom of writing sermons, or skeletons of 
serm_ons, has become much more common 
than it was among the fathers of the de- 
nomination; and all, or nearly all, of our 
ministers preserve in manuscript such 
ample minutes of the plan, topics, and 
arguments, of their pulpit exhibitions, as 
may serve for future use. The propriety 
of such a course is unquestionable ; and 
our objections are only directed against 
the grievous, ruinous abuses, to which it is 
perverted. After some time spent in the 
ministry, a studious man finds himself in pos- 
session of a good supply of prepared discour- 
ses, sufficient, in all probability, to meet the 
demands of a circuit or station for the one 
or two years which our plan allows him to 
spend with the same congregation. By a 
judicious intermingling of these old ser- 
mons with others prepared from week to 
week, and adapted to the special exigencies 
of the work, a conscientious, industrious 



RELATION TO MEXTy\L CULTURE. 75 

man, secures invaluable time, not only for 
pastoral duties, but for such mental culture 
and new acquisitions as shall insure a con- 
stant growth in wisdom, influence, and 
usefulness, from youth to old age. To 
those who know how to improve it, our 
itinerant ministry offers, in this respect, a 
special advantage over a more permanent 
settlement ; and some of our preachers 
eagerly avail themselves of its facility. 
Upon not a few promising young men, 
however, this pecuharity of our system 
operates not only disadvantageously, but 
fatally. When their stock of sermons, or 
plans, has accumulated, so far as to answer 
current demands upon it, they make no 
more, and cease to be students. There is 
an end to ail improvement ; and they 
stagger on to premature mental decrepi- 
tude under the burden of these some four 
or five hundred stale, antiquated sermons. 
In not a few instances, the victims of this 
stupendous offense against the human un- 
derstanding, and the claims of God upon 
his ministers, reach their climacteric at 
thirty years of age ; after which they neither 



76 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

Study nor think, unless we are to dignify as 
intellectual efforts the half hour devoted, 
from week to week, to conning over the 
well-remembered, venerable manuscript. 
Every one in the least acquainted with the 
powers and laws of the mind is able to 
comprehend the stupendous folly of these 
men. The human intellect gains expan- 
sion, and vigor, and acuteness, by activity. 
It must work, or dwindle and starve. It 
must THINK — think habitually, earnestly, 
consecutively — or it will, ere long, lose its 
power of thinking. The perusal and re- 
perusal of yellow manuscripts is not study.' 
The recollection and repetition of old ser- 
mons is not thinking. The mind must do 
something — must invent something fresh — 
must work and wrestle with new prob- 
lems and deep propositions, in order to 
give hardness and vigor to its own sinews. 
The hand that wields the hammer, or plies 
the graving tool, constantly gains strength 
and skill ; but suspended in a sling, it will 
not be long in forgetting its cunning. The 
Hindoo devotee who has been stationary 
ever since he learned to stand on one 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 77 

foot, has also lost the power of loco- 
motion. 

Our objection is not to the quality of the 
old sermons. They may be very good, and 
theoretically very well adapted to the existing 
wants of the hearer. It is possible they are 
even better than the preacher may now be 
able to produce. All this may very likely be 
true, and yet they may be useless to the peo- 
ple, and discreditable to the preacher : while 
very inferior discourses, fresh from the mint 
of the soul, and blazing with the fervors of 
an excited, laboring mind, will awaken pro- 
found emotion in the hearer's, as well as the 
preacher's, heart. Old sermons are preach- 
ed with good effect by men who are still in 
the habit of making new ones, and who 
keep their intellects thoroughly awake by 
study and invention. They then receive 
a new endowment of life and power, a 
new assimilation to the pious spirit, by 
passing through such an intense resuscitat- 
ing medium. Without this fresh, vivifying 
baptism, these repetitions are, irrespective 
of their intrinsic quality, the stalest and 
most unsavory of human performances. 



78 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

They remind us of the desiccated prepara- 
tions of the botanist, which are quite bereft 
of all their fragrance, and grace, and 
charming colors, though one might not be 
prepared to deny that they still retain a 
measure of latent medicinal virtue. It 
may be laid down as a first principle, that 
he cannot long continue a useful, nor even 
a popular, preacher, who has ceased to be a 
student. He must himself gradually lose 
all relish for the dry, irksome work of memory 
and repetition, to which he dooms himself 
However habit or temperament may enable 
him to preach with apparent warmth and 
vivacity, his announcements of truth do in 
fact no longer bear the sanction and indorse- 
ment of his own deep, living convictions ; 
for neither reason, nor conscience, nor faith, 
are much concerned in the reproduction. 
If this sort of work is distasteful to the 
preacher, it soon becomes loathsome to the 
hearer, with whom all such exhibitions pass 
for mere routine or declamation. A cleri- 
cal brother lately said to me, " I know seve- 
ral preachers in the Conference, who 

have not studied in ten or twenty years." 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 79 

Such ministers are only less guilty than 
those who have not 'prayed in ten years ; for 
it is quite as practicable to be a good preach- 
er of the gospel without praying, as without 
studying. No minister can maintain a re- 
spectable position, and satisfy the wants of 
an intelligent congi'egation, who is not a 
diligent student. No matter if he has a cart- 
load of prepared sermons, and they as good 
as ever Paul preached, he must bring out 
"things new," as w^ell as old, if he would 
make his ministrations either profitable or 
acceptable to the people. At least half of 
the sermons called for by the exigencies of 
ministerial labor should be produced by 
current efforts. To say nothing of doing 
good to others, the study and preparation 
of one sermon a week is no more than is 
requisite for the best nurture of mental and 
moral life. The greatest boon that could 
befall many preachers, would be the confla- 
gration of their old store of m.anuscripts. 
Anything that should induce or compel them 
to return to studious habits, were better than 
the mental inactivity which dooms so many 
good men to actual inefficiency and super- 



80 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

annuation, at a time of life when experience 
and hoarded wisdom should qualify them 
for the most extended usefulness, and the 
most salutary, effective popularity. Self- 
educated men are not less — it may be they 
are even more — exposed to this deadly sin, 
than the graduates of our colleges. If the 
latter often mortify their friends, and bring 
reproach upon the cause of education, by 
their indolence, and consequent miserable, 
petty mediocrity ; the former, with no less 
frequency, disappoint the favorable hopes 
awakened by their early proficiency, and 
fall back, from a position won by manly 
efforts, and full alike of honor and of pro- 
mise, to a grade of performances and aspi- 
rations false to all the traditions and antici- 
pations to which such auspicious beginnings 
had given rise in the church. 

No subject connected with our itinerant 
ministry, and with the great interests provi- 
dentially intrusted to it, is more worthy of 
deep, solemn consideration, than that so im- 
perfectly discussed in this note. That the 
evil referred to is not rare among us, every 
observing man knows full well. That it 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 81 

must, to whatever extent it prevails, impair 
the efficiency, the respectabihty, and the 
moral integrity of our ministry, is too pain- 
fully obvious to require proof or argument. 
The church had need to watch vigilantly 
against this great delinquency. Our minis- 
ters, both in open conference and in their 
private intercourse, are wont to exercise 
over each other a supervision comprehen- 
sive and searching, beyond anything known 
among other denominations. Something 
might possibly be done, in this way, to miti- 
gate a great, if not a growing, evil. But 
the remedy chiefly to be relied on, rests with 
individual conscience, with our young min- 
isters especially, whose mental habits are 
not yet formed, or if formed, not yet pervert- 
ed. It is for them to determine whether, 
with the increasing advantages of education, 
of many and cheap books, and of more leisure 
for study, our ministry shall grow in grace and 
knowledge ; whether our revered itinerancy 
shall continue to show itself adapted to the 
increasing intelligence and refinement of 
the age. That this, and much more, is 
practicable, we do most devoutly believe ; 

6 



82 CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLE IN 

but the full success of the great experiment 
demands a great increase of knowledge and 
intellectual accomplishments among our cler- 
gy. Nothing less will do. Nothing less can 
sustain us where we are, or prevent decline 
and deterioration. Ardent, self-sacrificing 
piety, is a qualification always presupposed 
in a minister of Christ, about which there 
is no need that anything should be said in 
this connection, further than to insist upon 
that particular manifestation of it which 
leads to thorough, systematic, various, pro- 
tracted study. For this nothing can be taken 
as a substitute. True, " it is better to save 
souls than to study.'' The eflfect is more 
excellent than the cause ; but it cannot ex- 
ist independent of its cause : and nothing is 
more idle than the common plea of much 
preaching, or much pastoral visiting, as an 
apology for little study, and poor, stale ser- 
mons. Preaching, eflfectual, good preach- 
ing, is what the gospel relies on for success, 
and this, without diligent study, is an im- 
possibility. Whoever attempts to divorce 
what God has joined together, will be suffi- 
ciently rebuked by an unblessed, uncomfort- 



RELATION TO MENTAL CULTURE. 83 

able, unwelcome ministry. He may be 
popular, and even useful, in the heyday of 
youth, when personal advantages — sweet 
tones, glossy ringlets, flowing sympathies — 
and still more, good hopes generously 
cherished by the church, and not yet 
blasted, plead in his favor : but some higher 
demands await his maturer years. Gray 
hairs must come crowned with superior 
wisdom and piety, if they will conciliate 
reverence and affection; and he alone who 
does not despair of remaining always young, 
is excusable for omitting to provide betimes 
for the exigencies of a period which will 
sternly require the fulfillment of all early 
promises. 



THE END. 



RESOURCES AND DUTIES 



OF 

CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 

A DISCOURSE TO THE 

GRADUATING CLASS OF WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY, 
AUGUST, 1845. 

BY STEPHEN OLIN, D, D. 

GEORGE PECK, EDITOR. 
PUBLISHED BY LANE & SCOTT, 

200 Mulberry-street. 
JOSEPH I^ONGKINGj PRINTER, 

1849. 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1846, by 
G. Lane & C. B. Tippett, in the Clerk's Office of the District 
Court of the Southern District of New-York 



PREFACE, 



The following discoui'se is published at the re- 
quest of the class of young gentlemen for whose 
benefit it was delivered, and to them it is now affec- 
tionately inscribed. 

I have esteemed it a misfortune that my personal 
intercourse with the students of the university has 
been so frequently interrupted since my official rela- 
tion to them commenced, and that I have hitherto 
enjoyed fewer opportunities than I had confidently 
and reasonably expected for the inculcation, whether 
in the pulpit or the lecture room, of such Christian 
lessons as, from time to time, might seem adapted 
to their circumstances and wants. The improving 
condition of the affairs of the institution will, I trust, 
hereafter leave me at liberty to devote a larger por- 
tion of my efforts to the more appropriate duties of 
my station. In the mean time, I gladly avail myself 
of the present occasion to place in the hands of my 
young friends, as well those who are still under my 
watchcare as those who have gone forth into the 



4 PREFACE. 

busy world, my exhortation and advice in regard to 
several topics in which they are likely to feel a 
lively and increasing interest. 

I suppose educated young men to be peculiarly 
liable to the false reasonings and seductive influ- 
ences w^hich it is the object of the following pages 
to counteract and expose : but I have miscalculated 
the evil tendencies of the times, if the admonitions 
of this discourse are not found applicable to a far 
larger class of our youth. To this most interesting 
portion of the Christian community these unpretend- 
ing suggestions are here presented, with my earnest 
prayers that God's blessing may attend and make 
them, in some degree, subservient to the promotion 
of an earnest and stable pie';y. 



RESOURCES AND DUTIES 



OF 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 



" Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not pro- 
vision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof." 

Romans xiii, 14. 

This text is highly figurative, but its 
intention and import are very obvious. It 
is an exhortation to be evangeLLcally and 
thoroughly religious. The first eleven 
chapters of the Epistle to the Romans are 
devoted to the exposition and inculcation 
of Christian doctrines. The tw^elfth and 
thirteenth are hortatory and preceptive. 
They announce our practical duties, and 
warn of dangers to be shunned. They 
declare, with authority and without any 
reserve at all, that we are held, under the 
gospel dispensation, to the highest style of 
virtue, both in the motive and in the per- 
formance. As far as concerns the principle 



b RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

of our movements in the new life, " love is 
the fulfilling of the law,'' while in point of 
fact and actual manifestation, believers are 
called upon to " present their bodies a 
living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto 
God, which is their reasonable service," 
to " prove what is that good, and accept- 
able, and perfect will of God." Our text 
announces the true method of attaining 
these vital Christian objects in reference 
both to the motive and the manifestation t 
" Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and 
make not provision for the flesh, to fulfill 
the lusts thereof." 

There is a numerous and very interest- 
ing class of persons entitled to our respect 
by their intelligence and moral worth, and 
appealing strongly to our sympathies by 
the false and highly critical position which 
they occupy. They are undoubting be- 
lievers in the Christian religion, and warm,^ 
avowed admirers of its sublime theology, 
pure ethics, and divine philanthropy. Yet 
they are not Christians. They are desti- 
tute not only of the hopes, but also of the 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 7 

helps, of the gospel. Something of its 
morals they contrive to exemplify. Some 
chill, half-extinguished rays from the Sun 
of righteousness are allowed to blend with 
their philosophy, and give coloring to their 
maxims of life ; but as a religious system, 
claiming the profoundest homage, and the 
most unreserved obedience — they only 
contemplate it from afar, and sedulously 
shun all personal contact and near com- 
munion with it. As a religious system, 
that is to say, as to all the ends for which 
God has made this great revelation to the 
world, the gospel is to these men but a nul- 
lity, and, for all practical results, all one as 
a lie. The moral attitude of these be- 
lievers, who yet refuse to be Christians, is 
painfully anomalous as well as grossly at 
variance with all right reason and the 
manifest fitness of things, just in propor- 
tion as their convictions are clear, and their 
faith satisfactory. Speculate upon it as a 
mere phenomenon apart from all evil con- 
sequences ;— what a spectacle of absurd 
folly and self-degradation is it for a rational 
being to live in habitual contempt of the 



8 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

sure teachings of his own reason and expe- 
rience ; or for a moral being to live in per- 
petual conflict with his conscience ? What 
should we think of a man of mature age 
and unimpaired vision, who should delibe- 
rately wallc into a flood, or into a confla- 
gration ? What should we think of a com- 
munity sldlled in the laws and liabilities 
of our earthly being, which should con- 
temn all the promises of seed time and 
harvest, and blindly and bravely advance 
to meet the inevitable famine ? What but 
that chance or Heaven had smitten them 
with madness, the dixe precursor of im- 
pending destruction ! Yet the infatuation 
we are now seeking to expose is greater 
and worse than this, in the same degree 
that eternal things are more important than 
temporal. What right has a man, I do not 
speak of him now as a creature of God, 
and responsible at his tribunal, but as a 
man accountable to himself, and bound to 
maintain some degree of self-respect as 
well as to make some provision for his 
own wellfare, present and prospective, — 
what right has he to trifle with his own 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 9 

destiny, and to perpetrate such enormities 
as the shutting of his ears and his eyes 
against the words and the manifestations 
of the divine mercy toward him ? He is 
a being with strong passions, which need 
to be chastened and controlled — of power- 
ful tendencies downward as well as up- 
ward, which call for checks — of immortal 
aspirations, which struggle for their sphere 
and their proper satisfactions. These un- 
felt, undying wants, for which the gospel 
alone has made adequate provision, are so 
many voices rising up out of the bosom 
of our human nature, to rebuke and shame 
the believing impenitent out of his stupen- 
dous folly and more stupendous guilt. 

It is to be remembered that the gospel 
is a voluntary system, under which no one 
becomes virtuous or pious without seeking 
to become so. It is under this condition 
that it appeals to our moral susceptibili- 
ties ; and not to yield obedience to the caU, 
is both to leave this part of our nature 
without development and training, and to 
inflict upon it positive violence. Religion 
too has its times and seasons. The dews 



10 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

of its grace are specially adapted to tender 
plants and fresh opening flowers, and are 
less congenial and less effectual when the 
growth is more advanced, and the root has 
struck deeper into the hard, arid soil of this 
world. E^eligion has its special lessons for 
youth, which cannot be learned, or if learn- 
ed, are no longer of much practical import- 
ance in maturer life. It seeks to lay its 
molding hand upon young, unsophisti- 
cated minds, that it may bring out fine 
specimens of redeemed humanity for God's 
glory and for heavenly bliss. It does not, 
and it cannot, change the leopard's spots. 
Repetition and reiteration have given to 
these simple statements the character and 
authority of proverbs, and, I am sorry to 
say, the infirmity of trite maxims ; yet are 
they the suggestions of the highest phi- 
losophy, and the most venerable expe- 
rience, and they are so many arguments in 
favor not only of becoming pious, but of 
doing so at the right time. 

Religion, to be genuine and efFective, 
must be ostensible and avowed. Let no 
one hope to work otit his salvation, or 16 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 11 

secure any, even the smallest of the spi- 
ritual advantages which the gospel offers, 
by stealth. God, and our own moral na- 
ture, call for open, manly confession, and 
both will assuredly disown and denounce 
all pretensions to piety which shun ex- 
posure to the broad light of the day. No- 
thing can be effectually done in this work 
till the sincere aspirant after Christian 
excellence fairly assumes his position, and 
becomes, as he is intended to be, " a spec- 
tacle to men and to angels " — " a city set 
on a hill that cannot be hid." We not 
only have lessons to learn for our own 
improvement, but lessons to exemplify for 
the improvement of others and for the 
Saviour's honor. They only who run law- 
fully win the prize, and none others are 
likely to receive the precious aids indis- 
pensable to success. This we might expect 
from all we know of ourselves or of God's 
attributes, and of this we are notified in 
his word. Till a man assumes an avowed 
and recognized Christian position, he has 
no full scope for the exercise of his own 
proper resources, and no adequate occa- 



12 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

sions for calling up his powers. The state 
of indecision and divided aspirations which 
precedes the final and formal decision of 
this great question, is little better than a 
paralysis of the soul. There is seldom 
any distinct vision, and never any earnest, 
well-directed purpose or action, until this 
moral crisis is passed. But with the as- 
sumption of his true Christian position, at 
the moment of " putting on the Lord Jesus 
Christ;" not on religious, supernatural 
grounds alone, but on philosophical also, 
the man receives an investiture of high 
powers and immunities. It is an im- 
portant point gained to have it known to 
which party we belong. The sight of the 
banner that floats over our heads will not 
fail of clearing away many annoyances 
and many enemies, and of bringing to our 
aid troops of powerful auxiliaries. The 
courage of the soldier rises with the putting 
on of his uniform, and still more at sight 
of the marshaled hosts that throng the out- 
spread field. 

The responsibilities of a Christian pro- 
fession, so often feared and shunned as 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 13 

intolerable burdens, under the pressure of 
which we are likely to make a disgraceful 
fall, ought rather to be invited as safe- 
guards and helps in the working out of 
our salvation. We are likely to walk cir- 
cumspectly as in the day, when conscious 
that the expectant eyes of friends as' well 
as foes are upon us. The pious ^neas 
had a double motive for flying from the 
burning city when he bore his aged father 
upon his shoulders, and led his infant son 
by the hand. 

The pursuits, too, in which religion 
employs us, have a direct and powerful 
tendency to expand and invigorate the 
virtues to which they give exercise. We 
begin feebly and faintly — ^it may be almost 
reluctantly. With infinite difficulty we 
drag ourselves away from the world, but 
more encouragements and fresh resources 
rise up in our path, and we speedily find 
that Christ has counter and stronger attrac- 
tions. His grace, ever the sole dependence 
of the humble Christian, operates at first 
but feebly ; beseeching, wooing, drawing 
us to be reconciled to God. It come.*;^, 



14 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

howeverj to exert an influence more and 
more decided. It animates, it enconrages-j 
it impels, it constrains us. We are borne 
onward by it as on the bosom of a great 
deep. Its prevalence becomes at length a 
domination, and the willing captive, bound 
but unconscious of his chains, loses, in the 
deep feelings of the devotion of his heart, 
all sense of his moral agency, which gives 
way to a law of love — -to a sort of pre- 
destination by the affections. Religion is 
no longer a drudgery, but a delight ; and 
he who could at first do nothing as it ought 
to be done, is enabled to do all things 
through Christ. 

At the same time that the resources 
of him who has fairly "put on the Lord 
Jesus Christ" are thus constantly and 
rapidly augmenting, the positive ob- 
stacles in the way of success gradually 
but surely diminish both in number and 
magnitude. In the first place, the evil 
passions and the devil can find little 
for one to do who is fully employed by 
the Saviour. Then bad habits, a great 
hinderance at first, grow weaker by disuse 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 15 

ancj jieglect Better tastes, too, are culti- 
vated ; so that what were seductive plea- 
sures, and so powerful temptations once, 
lose their character and become an offense. 
Walking by faith, the Christian appreciates 
more and more completely the excellence 
of the heavenly objects with which he is 
thus made famihar, and so acquires a 
standard of comparison which he can but 
be ever applying to the worldly objects 
and enjoyments that invite his regards. 
Such a process cannot fail to wean him 
from perishable good, and so leave him 
more free from every weight. 

While this Christian process strengthens 
perpetually the motives and the aids to 
piety, and abates the force of opposition, 
it has a yet stronger tendency to improve 
the quality of our virtues. Nothing is 
more likely to retard and discourage a 
generous mind, intent on the attainment 
of the highest excellence, than a perpetual 
consciousness, or even suspicion, that its 
best performances are marred by the ad- 
mixture of some base alloy; that some 
low, selfish motive mav have been active, 



16 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

though unperceived, in the production of 
its most shining deeds. We may acquire 
humility or modesty from worldly disap- 
pointments and mortifications, but some 
measure of misanthropy and discontent are 
likely to be derived from the same lessons. 
It is not always easy to practice benefi- 
cence and charity, to exert the highest 
public, or social, or private virtues, without 
having, whether we will or not, some re- 
ference to the returns which we are likely 
to receive in the form of gratitude, or 
reputation, or public confidence, or pos- 
thumous fame. This selfishness, to what- 
ever extent it mingles with our motives, 
not only produces a sense of self-degrada- 
tion, but it is, in fact, degrading to our 
performances and character ; and so largely 
does this debasing alloy enter into our 
spirit and conduct, and so utterly impos- 
sible is it to exclude it altogether, without 
some more potent exorcism than mere 
human virtue can summon to its assistance, 
that most men, after some vain struggles 
against its occult, malignant influence, 
yield to its dominion, and become satisfied 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 17 

with doing their duty, without much con- 
cern about the motive. Under such cir- 
cumstances it is but too obvious that virtue 
has nothing left besides its form and its 
name. It has no longer any power to 
purify, etherealize, and exalt our nature. 
It is a mere earthly thing, a matter of 
business, a balancing of interests and con- 
veniences, a skillful and comprehensive 
solution of the question, How can we take 
the best care of ourselves ? I am quite 
sure that many will find, in their own 
consciousness and recollections, manifold 
illustrations of the evil I have exposed. 
Now he who has " put on the Lord Jesus 
Christ," has found a perfect antidote for 
this eA*iL He has become a disciple, that 
he may be saved ; and he devotes his entire 
life to Christ, who was crucified for him, 
as a matter of gratitude and pious obliga- 
tion. '' Love is the perfecting of the law," 
and this is a motive from which self is 
wholly excluded. We work, we suffer, 
we live for another, even for Him who died 
for us, and rose again. When we have 
fully ^^ put on Christ," then is love made 



18 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

perfect, and all fear and all selfishness is 
fully " cast out." Disenthralled from all 
low, personal ends, and seeking only how 
we may please Christ, we enter upon a 
high, holy career of virtue, which can never 
know the taint of worldly maxims, which 
finds its model, its resources, and its ends, 
in Jesus Christ, our Lord, Gratitude, love, 
loyalty, these are the motives by which 
all heaven is swayed. They impel the 
angels onward in their career, and yet 
more the '' spirits of just men made 
perfect.'" Indeed, heavenly pursuits, and 
enjoyments, and virtues, are no other than 
those into which the good man is intro- 
duced when he " puts on Christ,'' — -the 
remote and invisible parts of the orbit in 
which he has already begun to move. 

As the Christian motive is the only one 
which can be trusted for purity, so it is 
the only one that can be relied on for ef- 
ficiency. " Love is stronger than death." 
A man will often do for the love of his 
friend, or his family, what he could not 
do on any lower impulse. But if affection 
for kindredj according to the flesh, is able 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 19 

to minister strong impulses to the spirit, 
the love of Christ " constrains us." It 
imparts an energy something more than 
human, and qualifies for achievements only- 
less than divine. A man's performances 
are likely to bear some proportion to the 
strength of the motives on which he acts. 
Now the gi'eat Christian motive, love to 
Christ, partakes of the superhuman and 
the godlike. It has the additional advan- 
tage of stability. It cannot be impaired 
by time, ~or change, or cu'cumstance, but 
attains dominion over the soul, potent in 
exact proportion to our progTCss in piety. 
The racer moves more swiftly as he ap- 
proaches the goal. A body tending to the 
earth, gains speed in its descent. So the 
Christian is borne on with an ever accu- 
mulating momentum as he draws nearer 
to perfection in faith and love. When we 
add that Christ has provided divine assist- 
ance for all exigencies to which om* human 
resources are unequal ; that he gives the 
Holy Spirit to help our infirmities — to as- 
sure our hopes, illuminate our minds, and 
purify our hearts — I am. unable to per- 



20 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

ceive what is yet wanting to a most 
admirable and all-sufficient apparatus of 
motives and means for the attainment of 
the highest moral excellence, and to the 
most glorious consummation of all that our 
fallen, but redeemed nature can aspire to. 

I have already intimated- — ^indeed, the 
text directly affirms, and this is its burden — 
that these great facilities for the prosecu- 
tion of our moral improvement are sus- 
pended on the one condition of a sincere 
and hearty adoption of the gospel. We 
are '' to put on the Lord Jesus Christ." 
He must become to us wisdom, and righte- 
ousness, and sanctification, and redemption 
— must be teacher, and priest, and only po- 
tentate. We must wear his livery, must 
go our warfare at his charges, and under 
his banner. Our dignity, our defense, and 
our exceeding great reward, must be sought 
and found in him. But we are not only 
called upon to make this entire dedication 
to Christ ; we are also cautioned against 
all reservations : " Make not provision for 
the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof" Faith 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 21 

in Christ, and a resort to the gospel for 
pardon, and purity, and eternal life, presup- 
pose an unconditional submission to its 
terms. Not one successful step can be 
taken in religion previously to the settle- 
ment of this gTand preliminary. The mind 
may not be able at the outset to take in 
all the particulars involved in this great 
act of submission, but it can and does 
embrace them implicitly ; and it is of the 
very essence of all right faith to confide in 
Christ to the uttermost, and to consent to 
follow him whithersoever he goeth, giving 
to the winds all anxiety about the special 
paths in which we may be called to pro- 
ceed in our onward march to heaven. 
Christ's dignity and sovereignty are con- 
cerned in imposing such conditions as he 
pleases, and in receiving no terms at the 
hand of the sinner ; and he will unques- 
tionably use his disciples in just such 
services, and impose upon them just such 
burdens, as he sees best, giving no pledges 
in adv^ince, but the assurance that his 
grace shall be sufficient for them. I know 
well that a multitude, even of professing 



22 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

Christians, begin and prosecute what is 
called a religious course, on a very different 
plan. They give law to religion. They 
retain as many indulgences, and concede 
as many sacrifices, as may fall in with 
their tastes. They make provision for 
pride, and ambition, and sensuality, and 
self-will, and "put on the Lord Jesus 
Christ" only in so far as they think he 
may set off their own purple and fine linen 
to the best advantage. But my business 
to-day is with the sincere, who wish to be 
made holy and to be saved by Christ, and 
who really desire to know the conditions 
of success. I take it upon me to warn all 
such to beware of admitting any worldly^ 
or selfish motive^ or consideration ivhatever^ 
into the settlement of this great question 
between God and their souls. I take it 
upon me to proclaim that all such tamper- 
ing in the business of religion will certainly 
prove fatal to any well-founded hopes of 
success in the Christian career. Whoever 
stops to inquire whether it may cost him 
sacrifices to be a Christian, with any inten- 
tion to hesitate if it does, has admitted a 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 23 

consideration utterly incompatible with his 
becoming a Christian at all. Whoever 
chooses his creed or his church with any, 
the slightest, reference to the honor, or the 
ease, or the emolument, it may give or 
withhold, does, by such an admission, ut- 
terly vitiate all his claim to have any part 
or lot in the matter of saving piety. I do 
not speak of those who knowingly and 
deliberately make these their chief grounds 
of preference ; but I affirm that it is wholly 
antichristian, and an insult to the crucified 
Saviour, to yield any, the smallest, place 
to worldly motives in choosing the Chris- 
tian position which we will occupy. Let 
Christ and conscience decide in this matter. 
" Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make 
not provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts 
thereof.'' The gospel will admit of no 
compromise here. This is its point of 
honor, which it cannot, and will not, yield 
by a single iota. I feel called upon to use 
the language of unmeasured denunciation 
against a mistake, so often fatal to hopeful 
beginnings in religion ; so very often fatal 
to the religious prospects of young men. 



24 KESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

I deem this point of sufficient importance 
to receive more particular and detailed 
illustration. 

Without stopping here to consider the 
grosser forms which this grave offense 
against the Saviour's dignity familiarly 
assumes, I will only refer to such as are 
most likely to be found in cultivated, as- 
piring minds. A demand is often put 
forth in this quarter for more tasteful de- 
velopments of Christianity than we are 
wont to meet with in its every-day history. 
Accustomed to look for the beautiful and 
the poetical in their speculations as well 
as in external objects, persons of this class 
can conceive of nothing higher or nobler 
in the gospel than its adaptations to min- 
ister to this universal want of cultivated, 
polished society ; and they have little true 
respect, and less sympathy, for any mani- 
festation of piety which does not conform 
to their special tastes. They have a theory 
on the subject, which requires that the 
divine Author of all the beauty and har- 
mony of the material world^ as well as the 



CHRISTIAN VOUNG MEN. 25 

world of intellect, should, for still higher 
reasons, observe the same gxeat principles 
in his plans and operations for bringing 
men to heaven. I have stated the sub- 
stance of the theory, which is, however, 
variously modified by habit, education, 
and temperament. And I remark that this 
demand upon the gospel quite loses sight 
of the fact, that the salvation of souls is 
its grand design and object, to which 
mental and social improvement are only 
incidental and secondary ; that Christianity 
finds the world immersed in darkness, and 
vice, and depravity; so that its great work 
on earth is that of elaboration, of reno- 
vation, of preparation, for a higher estate 
of mature graces and perfect harmonies. 
It has, of necessity, a great deal of rough 
work to do ; its processes must be adapted 
to the material to be acted on, no less than 
to the results to be produced. The sym- 
phonies divine that charm the angels are 
not so well fitted to this sinful world, which 
has contrived to array its tempers, and 
tastes, and tendencies, against its Maker, 
in a hostihty far more brutish than angelic. 



26 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

The means and appliances of the gospel, 
in order to be effective, must recognize the 
conditions and the disabilities of the beings 
over whom its conquests are to be won ; 
and whoever would be an effective co- 
worker with God in this broad field, must, 
like God, be content to accommodate his 
message and ministry to the multitude. 
Let no man who has raised himself to the 
great purpose of living for his race and 
for eternity, indulge in the idle fancy that 
he can gain his chosen end by herding 
with the philosophers, and propounding 
Christianity to the multitude in learned 
theses. Let him rather come down from 
the high places of intellectual pride, and 
put himself in communication with the 
masses. These are not yet polished, or 
intelHgent, or able to appreciate all that in 
heaven will be familiar as household words. 
In the most favorable state of society which 
has ever existed on the earth, the multi- 
tude of men have been uneducated — have 
been doomed to toil, and to comparative 
poverty. To this condition of our race the 
gospel at first adapted its lessons and its 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG xMEN. 27 

agencies, it may be, from choice, but as- 
suredly from necessity — a necessity that 
still exists in all its force. I may add, that 
the demand for more tasteful or philo- 
sophical developments of Christianity can 
only be satisfied at the expense of the im- 
mensely important class of men for whose 
special benefit the Chiistian revelation 
was promulgated — for " the gospel was 
preached to the poor." The reform pro- 
posed might accommodate the tenth of a 
tithe of the population of highly civilized 
nations ; but its natural tendency would be 
to separate this favored class from the 
masses, and bring them under a Christian 
culture, the most intellectual and graceful 
it may be, but wholly inapplicable to the 
condition and wants of the people. These, 
forsaken by their natural guides, their can- 
dlesticks removed from their midst, must 
sink into hopeless impiety and ignorance 
but for God's mercy, which is wont to in- 
terpose, a.nd raise up prophets from among 
themselves. 

But this divine interference for the pre- 
vention of results, utterly and eternally ruin- 



28 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

ous, does not adequately provide against 
some of the most deplorable evils that mar 
the piety, and fetter the energies, of the 
church. The gospel is a leveler, and con- 
templates our whole sinful race as " made 
of one blood." It will have " the rich and 
the poor meet together " at the feet of Je- 
sus, and forget all earthly distinctions in 
rapt meditation on the infinite goodness 
and glory of God, and on the heavenly 
world, to which they both look by faith, as 
to a common inheritance. It will have 
the lettered and the untaught, the high- 
born and the low, mingle before a common 
altar, and bow down before a common 
Saviour. It abhors caste, and is ambitious 
of bringing together in one vast brother- 
hood of faith, and feeling, and co-opera- 
tion, all blood-bought souls. It will have 
the rich contribute their wealth, the noble 
their influence, the learned their wisdom, 
the poor their sterling vulues, their patient 
toil, their might of sympathy and of sinew, 
to the building up of a pure and powerful 
church. It is by the combination of all 
classes, and all talents, that human society 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 29 

prospers most, and, for aught that appears, 
it is the Saviour's design to constitute and 
edify the church upon the same principle. 
Now the pride of man comes in to thwart 
this benevolent design. It will have an 
aristocracy, where Heaven can, least of all? 
tolerate it. It puts asunder what God has 
joined together. As far as the antichris- 
tian theory, against which I so earnestly 
protest, is carried out in practice, it mono- 
polizes and covers up the light. It se- 
questers talent and influence but to place 
them in positions where they act not at 
all, or at the greatest disadvantage, upon 
the general interests of religion and hu- 
manity. 

Nor must I pass over, as too unim- 
portant to deserve notice, the inevitable 
tendency of this religious exclusiveness to 
generate a spirit and a power antagonist 
to the universal equality guarantied by 
our free institutions. We have no privi- 
leged orders, nor is it likely, in the existing 
temper of the public mind, that talent, or 
wealth, or ancestry, or even great virtues, 
will ever give to their possessors a social 



30 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

position dangerous to the rights of the 
humblest citizen ; but I must think the 
lovers of our republican institutions and 
manners will have some cause for solici- 
tude, if the growing tendency among our 
influential classes to desert the popular 
walks of religion, for more select and pre- 
tending connections, shall increase in a 
similar ratio for twenty or fifty years to 
come. The danger is not at all diminish- 
ed by Christian forms and names ; and a 
religious aristocracy which is completely 
sheltered under the guaranties of universal 
freedom of conscience, secured to all by 
our free institutions, has no security to give 
in return to those institutions, that it will not 
at least generate a spirit dangerous to their 
purity and perpetuity. No pride is more 
blinding and corrupting than spiritual pride, 
and men who are ever fancying themselves 
upon a lofty eminence, unconsciously ac- 
quire a habit of looking doivn upon the 
rest of the world.^ 

A question of far deeper import is this : 
What are the more strictly religious effects 

"^ See Note A, at the end. 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 31 

of this defection from the popular Chris- 
tianity upon the persons most concerned ? 
How is it with the dainty seceders who 
loathe the manna that " covers the face of 
the wilderness," of which "every man may 
gather according to his eating," and deem 
it distasteful to receive with the multitude, 
seated on the ground, the bread which Jesus 
so liberally blesses and breaks ? Of all who 
lightly turn away from the lowlier faith 
of their early education and their fathers' 
house, to rear their showy altars upon the 
high places of the land, whether seduced by 
vanity, or ambition, or fastidiousness, it may 
well be doubted if many secure more than 
the shadow of true religion. If they have 
borne with them to this false, exposed po- 
sition, some measure of spirituality, the 
growth of a more fruitful soil, and of a more 
benignant clime, it speedily withers and 
decays for want of a participation in those 
popular sympathies, from which they start 
back with a disgust so profound. Their 
dwelling places are unquestionably on the 
Parnassus or the Olympus of the Chris- 
tian world, but these mountain tops have 



32 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

neither depth of earth, nor springs of wa- 
ter, and no plant of righteousness is likely 
to strike its roots into the hard rock that 
composes their shining but arid summits. 

Such aristocratic aspirants after a grace- 
ful piety, (I call them aristocratic for 
want of a better term to mark this per- 
verse development of Christianity,) natu- 
rally fall into two classes, and exhibit two 
great corruptions of the gospel. The more 
intellectual and philosophical part com- 
monly wander into that cold region of un- 
fruitful speculations, where rationalism or 
transcendentalism, or whatever neology 
happens to be in fashion, claims empire. 
The merely fashionable, and ambitious, 
and fastidious portion, more usually pay 
their courtly homage to gi'aceful forms or 
venerable reminiscences, and find and ex- 
hibit, at least, some of the semblances of 
spiritual piety in the religion of the imagi- 
nation.* 

I cannot part with the topic under con- 
sideration without bestowing a passing 
thought upon the God-dishonoring senti- 

* See Note B, at the end. 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 33 

ments in which this deplorable fallacy has 
its origin. This demand for a Christianity 
more refined and tasteful than that of 
Christ, proceeds upon the assumption that 
God is specially pleased and honored by 
the conversion of persons of literary taste, 
and polished -manners; of men accustom- 
ed to good society, and well read in good 
authors. Disguise it as we wall, that is 
the fundamental idea of this antichristian 
theory. Now, for aught that appears, these 
accomplishments do not figure very large- 
ly in Heaven's estimate of man. I cannot 
help suspecting that John Bunyan, John 
Nelson, and worthies of this class, wore, in 
God's sight, the insignia of a truer and 
higher nobility, than the choicest spirits of 
the brilliant eras of Elizabeth and Anne. 

What are the attributes most prized and 
most sought for in man, by the crucified 
Saviour ? Charity and purity. These are 
the cardinal virtues of the gospel. Every 
one that loveth is born of God, and know- 
eth God. If we love one another, God 
dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in 

us. God is love, and he that dwelleth in 

3 



34 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

love, dwelleth in God, and God in hirn. 
The entire law is fulfilled by him who 
loves God with all the heart, and his neigh- 
bor as himself. This is glory to God in 
the highest, peace on earth, and good will 
to men. The gospel is satisfied when this 
great end is achieved, and it labors, from 
age to age, to implant this law of univer« 
$al affinity 9^nd brotherhood in all hearts, 
and thus to establish a vast system of or- 
der and divine harmony, worthy of the 
wisdom and of the mercy of God. And 
this is its primary, proper object. High in- 
tellectual culture, advanced civilization, re- 
finement of sentiments and of manners, 
do indeed attend, or rather follow, its pro- 
gress, but only as incidental results of the 
great moral changes which have their sphere 
in the moral nature and character of man. 
The moral transformation is all that the 
gospel, as such, aims to accomplish. This 
makes the sinner a child of God, fits him 
for heavenly society and pursuits, makes 
him a joint heir with Christ. These are 
no doubtful announcements, but first prin- 
cipl^§ of the gospel, which no sane Chris- 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 35 

tian will for a moment call in question ; 
and they suggest the irresistible conclusion, 
that that is the most Christian church, and 
that the most apostolic ministry, which 
most successfully accomplish these most 
Christian ends. No matter who they are 
that are converted, and sanctified, and 
brought to heaven. The ignorant, the 
outcast, the Hottentot, the slave — these are 
Christ's well-beloved brethren, and with 
him heirs of God. The princes of this 
world may be glad to go to heaven, if they 
may, in such company, and angels would 
exult to be co-workers with God in preach- 
ing the gospel to the poor. What lesson 
of instruction do I find in this digression ? 
A stern rebuke of that wi'etched fastidious- 
ness which refuses to be satisfied with such 
a type of Christianity as satisfies Christ — 
demonstrative proof that this reiterated de- 
mand for a more tasteful and philosophical 
religion is unreasonable and unphiloso- 
phical, as well as unchristian — new force 
in the exhortation, *' Make not provision for 
the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof." Would 
you find for yourselves a religion adapted 



36 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

to the soul's pressing wants, and to the de- 
mands of a perishing world ? Drink deeply 
of the Christian sentiments and sympa- 
thies of the people. Would you act a 
heroic part in the holy war which God and 
good men are carrying on against error 
and sin ? Throw yourselves into the midst 
of the masses, where there are most hearts 
to be won, and most souls to be saved. Do 
not be for ever gazing at the toy that glit- 
ters on the top of the steeple, but bend 
your regards upon the living stones that 
compose ChrisVs holy temple, upon the 
undying souls that throng its inner and 
outer courts. There the true altar and the 
authorized priest are sure to be found, and 
there God has work to do for all, who, like 
his well-beloved Son, are content to abase 
themselves, that they may be exalted. 

I have not left time for the discussion 
of some other topics which I cannot wholly 
overlook. Educated young men often find 
another stumbling block in the presumed 
or dreaded interference of an honest con- 
secration to Christ with their ambitious, 
and, as they are prone to esteem them, 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. ^7 

their pure and honorable asph'ations. My 
own observations on this subject would 
lead me to regard this as one of the most 
common and fatal causes of backsliding, 
as well as procrastination. Many, who 
hear and recognize the voice of God, re- 
fuse to enter his vineyard, because they 
are not quite sure that the employments 
and immunities to be assigned them there 
will be agreeable and satisfactory. Im- 
piety never assumes a more daring attitude 
than this, however the rank offense may 
be disguised or concealed by circumstances 
or by false reasonings. What is implied by 
the postponement or abandonment of a re- 
ligious course on such grounds ? Distrust 
in God is implied, and unbelief in its most 
odious, atrocious, insolent form. Has God, 
then, no right to interfere with our plans ? 
This mental discipline, and these accom- 
plishments, which are too good to be sub- 
jected to his control — ^were they acquired 
— are they held, on terms altogether inde- 
pendent of Jehovah ? Is the inexperienced 
youth, fresh from the schools and prover- 
bially ignorant of the world, and of the 



38 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

future, somewhat better qualified to choose 
his own way, and thread the labyrinth of 
life alone, than God is to guide him ? You 
will not be a Christian, because that con- 
fessedly assigns you a sphere of action 
where God and conscience must be consult- 
ed. You seek a freer range and a wdder 
sphere. Take them, and then inquire if 
you are beyond the domain of God. Are 
you really freer to choose or surer to win ? 
Is responsibility excluded, or danger of dis- 
appointment and disaster ? No ; for God 
reigns everywhere. All that is gained by 
this daring revolt against his authority is 
the dire privilege of working out our des- 
tiny without any promise of guidance, or 
grace, or reward, yet always under the 
divine supervision and control — always in 
conflict with his revealed will — always ob- 
noxious to his displeasure, and certain of 
ultimate ruin whatever fortunes may be 
conceded to a career which is, at best, only 
a prolonged rebellion against God* 

After saying so much of the religious 
aspects of this case, I must not omit to 
expose the shallow views of life on which 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 89 

this great practical error is based. Asa class, 
truly pious men are the most fortunate in the 
world. Estimate their successes by honors 
won, by their usefulness, by their attain- 
ments, or by their enjoyments, and these 
persons greatly outstrip their competitors. 
I will not stop to inquire why it is so, 
though I doubt not there is in the thing 
both a divine providence and a divine phi- 
losophy. Heaven guides and cheers on 
the man who is content to receive his com- 
mission from above, while the virtues and 
safeguards of religion do naturally minis- 
ter to his successes even in secular pur- 
suits. The fact, however, is all I contend 
for here. Common experience is a demon- 
stration that godliness is profitable for this 
life, as well as that to come. It is some- 
thing more than impiety — ^it is gross, blind 
folly, for a young man, setting out in life, 
to guard against the disturbing influence 
of religion in the settlement of his plans. 
God is likely to be his wisest counselor, 
and his most powerful auxiliary, and to 
exalt him in proportion to the humility of 
his submission to the divine authority. 



40 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

I must add another remark. It is un- 
questionably true that piety often pro- 
motes, while it seldom retards, a man's 
progress in the world. It is no less so, and 
no less proper to mark the fact, that men 
who seek to make of religious pretensions, 
and church relations, instruments of ambi- 
tion or gain, are almost sure of meeting 
with signal disappointment. Success in 
such attempts would offer a dangerous 
temptation to human virtue, and fill the 
churches with hypocrites ; but success in 
such attempts, in such a country as this, 
where the government is neutral, and all 
sects have fan* play, is nearly impossible. 
Aristocracy in religion meets with a potent 
antagonist in the legal and social democ- 
racy that universally prevails. Proscription 
for religious opinions is nearly impractica- 
ble in any form, where there is a multitude 
of sects, and the weak are prone to unite 
against any encroachment by the strong. 
In such a state of things there is an open 
field for industry and merit, in which no 
sectarian badge can win or lose the prize. 
There is no reward for the hypocrisy which 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 41 

would profess, or the base cowardice, or 
he:irtless prudence, which would shun to 
profess, any opinion or bear any name, for 
selfish objects. The temptation to sin in 
this matter is really so weak that there is lit- 
tle need of providing any safeguard against 
it, beyond a statement such as has been 
made. Neither cupidity nor vanity has 
much to gain by ** making provision for 
the flesh,'' when neither emolument nor 
influence are to be won bv recreancv to 
principle. 

The short-sighted ambition which covets 
higher and brighter spheres of effort and 
manifestation than comport with the claims 
of duty, or the mTangements of Providence, 
is wont to fall into another capital eiTor. 
In paying to circumstances their vain 
court for facilities and rewards, seldom 
granted but as the fruit of patient labor 
and practical self-denial, these impatient 
aspirants after distinction are insensibly 
led away trom the only theatre of action 
adapted to their character and attainments. 
Talent is ever best developed, and common- 
ly best rewarded, where it is most wanted. 



42 RESOURCES AxND PUTIES OF 

It should therefore respect the great laws of 
demand and supply ; and while the wide 
earth and boundless sea are open to its en- 
terprise, should never press too eagerly into 
petty, glutted marts. An educated Christian 
young man, who, in all the attainable good 
before him, has eyes to see something bet- 
ter and nobler than mere pecuniary gain, 
cannot fail to perceive a most hopeful field 
of usefulness in his connection with one 
of the great popular Christian denomina- 
tions of ihis country. It is unavoidable, 
that among the vast multitudes, so rapidly 
gathered into these broad folds by primi- 
tive zeal and labors, many will lack culture, 
and intelligence, and refinement. Edu- 
cation and literature, polished eloquence, 
and profound learning, naturally follow, 
though they seldom precede, the greatest 
successes of young and rising sects. When 
such wants are most pressing, precisely 
then is there likely to exist the most urgent 
demand for such qualifications to satisfy 
them. 

A religious community whose successes 
have outstripped all its anticipations, sud- 



CHRISTIAJN YOUNG MEN. 43 

denly finds itself responsible for the intel- 
lectual, as well as moral, improvement of 
millions. It has reached a point in its his- 
tory where a demand for cultivated talent 
is of the most urgent character. It must 
have educated men ; and literary attain- 
ment, when united with piety and good 
sense, is sure to be placed in positions 
the most favorable for the efficient exer- 
tion of extensive and salutary influence. 
It almost necessarily happens that learning, 
and eloquence, and refinement, acquke a 
consideration and a power to do good, 
great in proportion to their scarcity, and to 
the multitude of demands upon such qua- 
lifications. Just such a theatre as enlight- 
ened, sanctified ambition should most de- 
sire, is here opened to the Christian youth. 
It proffers useful, congenial, and honor- 
able employment. It insures the earliest, 
fullest development of his mental and moral 
resources. It promises all reasonable and 
desirable exemption from the tedious proba- 
tion and discouraging competition which he 
may be doomed to encounter elsewhere. It 
offers him equal and honorable partnership 



44 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

in the holy work of training a host of im- 
mortal beings for usefulness, purity, happi- 
ness, and heaven. The folly of turning 
away from these outspread fields waving 
with golden harvests, and echoing all around 
with Macedonian cries for more laborers, 
is only less than the guilt which is always 
superadded, when, in addition to this con- 
tempt for the suggestions of a sound dis- 
cretion, some violence is also inflicted upon 
the conscience. And here I cannot refrain 
from a passing remark on the benignant 
relations which religion ever sustains to 
the practical movements of business and 
of life. So nicely and so graciously is the 
great scheme of an overruling, watchful 
providence, adapted to our various circum- 
stances, that the most inexperienced youth 
— the merest novice in aftah's— has little 
more to do, than simply to obey the dic- 
tates of an enlightened conscience, in or- 
der to secure all the advantages of the 
most comprehensive and well-digested 
plans, and of the deepest insight into the 
future. An unwavering trust in God and 
his word is the best guide, as well as 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 45 

the best safeguard. Jt is a great simplifier 
of life's complicated pursuits, and endows 
each single-hearted follower of Jesus Christ 
with a precocious, heavenly wisdom. 

In anything I have said, I do not mean 
to intimate that both our actual piety and 
our Christian profession may not involve 
the most serious consequences. I know too 
well the genius of the gospel, to inculcate a 
doctrine so foreign from its avowals and its 
spirit. Great sufferings and great sacrifices 
do, unquestionably, enter into God's en- 
tire scheme for diffusing and propagating 
the true religion, and for the moral discipline 
of individuals. Christ was made perfect by 
suffering, and through much tribulation we 
are called to enter into the Idngdom of 
heaven. Afflictions work out for the saints 
an exceeding weight of glory. Not only 
are Christians subject to the common lot 
of mortals, which is usually one of many 
pains and sorrows, but they are often call- 
ed to suffer for Christ's sake. It is funda- 
mental to the Christian system that men 
were redeemed by suffering, and hardly 
less so, as far as history is our teacher, 



46 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

that the best achievements of the gospel 
are to be carried in the midst of peril, and 
loss, and agony. In this great work of 
toil and sacrifice, it is no doubt the will of 
God that young men, and educated young 
men, shall have a principal share. God 
chooses them because they are strong, and 
he intends to make them the chief of his 
instruments for the accomplishment of his 
great designs of mercy. Let them look their 
calling fairly in the face, and enter on the 
career of duty, well aware of the conditions 
upon which they serve a crucified Pvcdeem- 
er. None more need to stir up the gift that is 
within them, to gird about their loins, and 
put on the armor of righteousness. I may 
safely say that no policy is so dangerous 
as caution and cowardice. I may confi- 
dently warn them of the folly and danger 
of " making provision for the flesh," by re- 
fraining from such a dedication as may 
exact from them the sternest conditions 
known to our Christian vocation. If great 
results can be attained by great efforts and 
great sufferings, what generous heart will 
refuse the sacrifice ? If our own holiness 



CHRISTIAxX YOUNG MEN. 47 

and the happiness of others may be pro- 
moted in proportion to the expenditure of 
toil, or talent, or wealth, who will not feel 
that the outlay is reasonable and even po- 
litic ? But the argument likely to be most 
effectual with ingenuous and truly pious 
minds is derived from_ the genius of our 
religion. The gospel is a way of salvation 
by grace. It lays the Christian under ob- 
ligations immeasurably strong, which he 
can never satisfy, while it awakens in him 
a sense of gratitude ever restless and stu- 
dious of methods by which it may testify 
its loyalty, and crown with honor the great 
Benefactor, who is too high to be repaid 
for ail his mercies. This deep, undying 
sentiment of the pious soul, finds utterance 
in thanksgiving and adoration — ^in prayer 
for the extension of the kingdom of Christ, 
and in all the wa.ys by which a sincere 
Christian makes manifestation of his piety. 
But the unwasted, struggling impulse gains 
strength by all its activities, and longs for 
new modes of exercise and development. 
Dissatisfied with the little it can do for the 
glory of the Sa\dour, it would gladly give 



48 RESOURCES AND DUl'IES OF 

its testimony by suffering. This feeling is 
natural ; and it is strong in every bosom 
in proportion as piety is profound and in- 
tense. It has led many misguided Chris- 
tians to devote themselves to penances and 
voluntary inflictions. It led the apostles to 
rejoice " that they were counted worthy to 
suffer for Christ." Paul avowed a desire to 
endure martyrdom for the satisfaction of 
this profound sentiment, and many early 
Christians joyfully submitted to the se- 
verest tortures as a testimony of their 
devotion and gratitude to Christ. Not 
many in these days of peace and tol- 
eration are likely to be called to pass 
through such an ordeal ; but if the spirit 
to suffer the loss of all things for Christ's 
sake be not stUl with us, then has 
the true glory of the church perished with 
her martyrs. Doubtless this spirit yet lives, 
and would be made manifest by fitting oc- 
casions. Doubtless there are multitudes 
who would encounter losses of all sorts — 
privations, labors, and even death itself — 
for the crucified Redeemer. They remem- 
ber his words, that if any love father, or 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 49 

mother, or brother, or sister, or houses, or 
lands, more than him, he cannot be a 
disciple. They remember that it is often 
more prudent to lose the life than to save 
it. Many even feel that they have a bap- 
tism to be baptized with, and are straiten- 
ed till they perform it. They are eager to 
live, and, if needs be, to die for Christ. 
They have " put on the Lord Jesus Christ, 
and made no provision for the flesh, to ful- 
fill the lusts thereof.'' Their cry is, " Speak, 
Lord, thy servant heareth." They are not 
careful to make conditions. Wheresoever 
God's Spirit or providence will lead, they 
stand ready to go ; neither do they call any- 
thing their own which they possess, whether 
of talent, learning, position, wealth, or in- 
fluence; but regard themselves only as 
stewards of the manifold grace of God, and 
servants to the church for Christ's sake. 
These are Christians such as Christ came 
down from heaven to raise up. They are 
the messengers of his mercy — ministers 
of grace. Their hearts throb in unison 
with Christ — their ears are open to every 

Macedonian cry. The church, this coun- 

4 



50 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

try, the age, and state of the world, want 
such Christians, and only want enough 
such, speedily to cover the earth with 
righteousness. 

I have no higher wish on behalf of the 
young men whom I now address, than to 
see them thoroughly imbued with the 
spirit of such a religion as I have attempted 
to exhibit. Put on, my friends, put ye on 
the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not pro- 
vision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts 
thereof. I may claim to feel the profound- 
est interest in your wellfare, but I am not 
afraid to trust you to the guidance of such 
auspices. Go forth clad in these robes of 
purity and beauty, protected by this impene- 
trable armor of righteousness, and none who 
love you will have anything to fear or to de- 
sire beyond. Christ will guide you aright. 
Precisely into such positions as are best 
suited to your talents, and most adapted to 
usefulness, will he be sure to lead you. 
And this is the only way for attaining at 
once the highest happiness and the most 
perfect development of the intellectual and 
moral powers. Here you are sure of hav- 



CHRISTIAxN YOUNG MEN. 51 

ing " grace sufficient for you," and that is 
the only sure pledge and hope for eminent 
success. Here alone you secure that har- 
mony and co-operation of the moral with 
the mental forces ; that conctuTcnce of the 
emotions with the intellect, indispensable 
to the fullest development, and the highest 
achievements, of a human being. 

I shall close by maldng of the exhorta- 
tion in the text a special application to 
those who hear me. I am too intimate 
with the liabilities and the actual history 
of young men, not to be aware that many 
of them act in direct opposition to the les- 
sons inculcated in this discourse. They 
deliberately "put off the Lord Jesus Christ," 
and that for the very purpose of making 
provision for satisfying the lusts of the 
flesh. They have found unexpected dif- 
ficulties in the way of a religious life on 
their first entrance upon the scenes of pub- 
lic education. The buoyancy and the 
levity of youth, the confluence of a mul- 
titude of petty temptations, small but eager 
rivahies, new demands upon time, and a 
new arrangement of thek hours, the esprit 



52 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

du corps which too often operates to an 
extent incompatible with an easy discharge 
of the highest moral duties ; these^ and 
many more nameless evils, often combine 
to test whatever integrity and strength of 
religious principle and habit the inexpe- 
rienced youth may have brought from 
more quiet scenes to the threshold of col- 
lege life. A brief season of trial, a manly 
bearing in the face of danger, an honest 
recurrence to first principles — more than 
all, humble reliance upon God, and a 
conscientious observance of the duties of 
religion, would soon overcome difficulties 
which are only formidable from their no- 
velty and their number. At this precise 
point not a few who come among us, with 
the fairest promise, abandon their religion. 
Some do it with apparent deliberation, and 
at once ; others gradually, and, it may be, 
insensibly, but none the less effectually and 
fatally. A vague purpose is commonly 
cherished of resuming it again under more 
favorable auspices, when temptations shall 
be fewer or weaker, and better helps avail- 
able. But for the present they put off 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 53 

Christ, and get their education and form 
their character without him seeming to 
regard themselves more free than before 
to indulge in doubtful pleasures and asso- 
ciations, and still more to omit the dis- 
tinctive duties and manifestations of a 
Christian profession. If conscience at 
first interpose some obstacles in the way 
of such a defection, it soon accommodates 
itself with a vicious facility to the cherished 
inclinations of the heart. I have often 
seen a hopefully pious youth thus throw 
away his armor in the day of battle, putting 
off Chiist just when he most needs to put 
him on — entering on a career of many 
dangers without religion, just because he 
thinks it will be difficult or unpleasant to 
get along with religion. He thus fairly 
uncovers his bosom to the envenomed 
shaft. He invites, yea, compels God to 
forsake him, and then rushes, blind and 
naked, into the midst of his foes. I speak, 
young gentlemen, of an experience not 
unknown among you ; not to reproach, 
but to warn. Some may have gone so 
far in this downward career, and have 



54 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

drunken so deeply of the cup of cursing 
which they have chosen, that the voice of 
affectionate admonition will be lost upon 
them. Not so, I trust, with others who 
hear me. The agony is not yet over with 
them. Shamefully have they slighted, 
deeply have they grieved, the Saviour; 
but their hearts yet beat quickly and sor- 
rowfully when they look upon Him whom 
they have pierced. You who have made 
a trial of this style in religion, say. Is it 
satisfactory ? Does it shield you in the day 
of peril? The enjoyments, the lusts of 
the flesh, for which you have provided at 
such enormous expense, are they, upon 
the whole, better than the peace of God 
and the love of Christ which you have 
lost ? If you look back with desire and 
self-reproach, then you have still a taste 
and a conscience for better things, and 
may, I trust will, rally and struggle to 
regain the position you have rashly aban- 
doned. 

Those who are about to leave this arena 
of preparation to enter upon new scenes 
of life, and engage in fresh enterprises, I 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 55 

beseech to listen to the instructions of this 
occasion. Do not venture to take a step 
into this dark, troublesome world, now 
opening before you, without a divine 
guide. You I may exhort with special 
emphasis, " Put ye on the Lord Jesus 
Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, 
to fulfill the lusts thereof.'' Fear to move 
in the grave matter of choosing your pro- 
fession, and forming the more permanent 
plans and relations of life, before you as- 
sume your proper religious position, and 
are thus enabled to act under divine direc- 
tion. You may not neglect this duty with- 
out incurring the entire forfeiture of God's 
promises and grace. Let me inquire of 
you, with an earnestness and solemnity 
befitting the importance of the interests 
involved, whether you have hitherto been 
true to your convictions of duty, whether 
your plans of life have thus far been form- 
ed prayerfully and conscientiously, in the 
best moods of your religious feelings, when 
you most fully appreciated Christ's su- 
preme claims ? Are there not in your 
bosoms half-stifled convictions, slumber- 



56 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

ing recollections of unpaid vows made 
under circumstances of deepest solemnity? 
Look over these archives of conscience 
with heedful deliberation. Resolutions, 
formed when your bosoms glowed with 
zeal and love for Christ, are most likely 
to be the wisest and the best. Bring your- 
selves back to the same moral attitude, 
and review these high, holy purposes, 
under the same clear manifestations that 
led to their formation, or you are likely to 
sin against your own souls irretrievably. 
" Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ," and 
then choose your way under his divine 
auspices. See to it that you make no 
provision for the jElesh in this deeply in- 
teresting crisis of your endless being. For 
God's sake do not blunder here. Remem- 
ber you choose for eternity, and that an 
error at this point must give a wrong di- 
rection to all your future career. You 
determine what you will do for Christ, and 
for men, and for your own souls. Choose 
honestly; choose bravely; fearing no la- 
bors, or crosses, or sufferings. Better far 
than honors or crowns are the sacrifices 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 57 

which fidelity to Christ shall impose upon 
yon. 

There is among our educated Christian 
young men a grievous offense, so common 
as to have become a sign of the times, and 
so full of evil tendencies as to call loudly 
for exposure and denunciation. I refer to 
the levity with which so many treat their 
early vows of consecration to the Christian 
ministry. Under convictions of duty and 
of a heavenly calling, always deeply felt 
and gratefully recognized in seasons of 
high religious enjoyment and spiritual 
devotion, they begin or prosecute their 
literary career as a preparatory training for 
the sacred office. With seasons of de- 
pression or declension come doubts, and 
reluctance, and dissatisfaction, with plans 
of life which really present few alluring 
aspects to the lukewarm, worldly-minded 
Christian. Such occasions are often chosen 
for testing the validity of the call to a work 
involving many sacrifices, and for which 
high spirituality and entire consecration to 
Christ are, confessedly, indispensable quali- 
fications. It is then no difficult task to 



58 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

discover deficiences which the least sensi- 
tive conscience must feel, and which there 
is even a strong temptation to magnify as 
the means of obtaining a release from obli- 
gations hitherto deemed sacred and invio- 
lable. I have briefly indicated the process 
by which many of our Christian students, 
designated for the ministry by the most 
unequivocal marks of a divine vocation, 
contrive to stifle their own convictions, 
and elude the sacred claims of the church 
and of the crucified Saviour. I can truly 
affirm that no other instances of religious 
defection and recreancy to sacred duties 
are wont to fill me with a sorrow so pro- 
found and inconsolable. I habitually look 
upon pious students with the deepest 
interest, as in a peculiar sense the property 
of Christ, not only as the purchase of his 
blood and the trophies of grace, but as the 
probable and fit instruments to be chosen 
for the enlargement of his kingdom. It is 
to be expected that many, so providentially 
prepared by literary training, should be 
divinely called to the ministry of recon- 
ciliation; and it is matter of unfeigned 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 59 

thankfulness, but none of surprise, that so 
large a proportion of converted students 
become deeply impressed with the duty 
of devoting themselves to this great work. 
Few, I believe, who maintain a devotional, 
cross-bearing spirit, ever fall into serious 
or lasting doubts about the authenticity 
of their heavenly calling. They may be per- 
mitted to pass through seasons of trial and 
self-examination for the establishment of 
their faith and for the attainment of a 
higher moral preparation for the exigences 
of their holy vocation ; but few sincere souls, 
I am persuaded, will ever be left to dis- 
card, as the result of fancy or of enthusiasm, 
these awful impressions of the highest 
duty. They who have been seduced by 
ambition, or indolence, or unbelief, or self- 
indulgence, from the higher walks of piety, 
do, indeed, bring upon themselves a moral 
state to which distrust, and distaste, and 
absolute repugnance, in regard to their 
proper mission, are natural and unavoid- 
able. They are no longer fit to be ministers 
of Christ; but this does not annul their 
call nor its binding obligations. The bur- 



60 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

den rests upon them none the less because 
the strength to bear it is gone. They have 
clearly fallen into the snare of the devil, 
and there is only one way of escape. They 
must revert to first principles, or be irre- 
trievably ruined. They must return to 
their first love — must revisit the sunny re- 
gions of divine grace and manifestation, 
where clear convictions and holy aspira- 
tions domineer over the soul— where love, 
and faith, and joy in the Holy Ghost im- 
part strength to sustain and light to guide. 
There is really no other alternative be- 
sides such a spiritual revival, for any who 
lack the nerve, to conclude that they can 
get along, in life and in death, without a 
Saviour. To keep this an open question, 
with some latent floating purpose, to take 
advantage of a day of feeble impulses and 
dim manifestation for sliding away into 
a secular profession, is to impose upon 
the mind and the heart an intolerable bur- 
den, the ominous pledge of comfortless 
progress, and of ultimate, shameful dis- 
comfiture. The interests of both worlds 
are equally concerned in such a choice of 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 61 

occupation as shall leave the conscience 
free to approve, and God free to patronize. 
To those who are rather timid than rebel- 
lious, and have still a stronger desire to win 
the crown than di-ead of bearing the cross, 
it may be right to point out the vast re- 
sources placed at their disposal, and of 
which they receive the investiture on as- 
suming their true position; but it must, 
after all, be admitted to be the mark of a 
degraded moral tone for a Christian man 
to manifest much anxiety for anything be- 
yond the doing of his duy. It has been 
well said that events belong to God ; and 
it may be added, that we are liliely to be 
made happier, as well as better and abler 
men, by every encounter with difficulties 
and every blast of adversity. These are 
God's chosen methods of discipline, and 
his appointed conditions of all eminent 
success. So true is this, even in common 
life, that we do not hesitate to pronounce the 
most unfavorable auguries of an educated 
young man, who, in his plans of life, makes 
an over-careful provision for self-indulgence 
and an exemption from severe toils and 



62 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

trials. If he will not push from the shore 
till he has taken pledges for a smooth sea 
and a favorable breeze — if he must, at all 
events, have sumptuous fare, and fine linen, 
and houses of cedar, he insists on conditions 
which neither Heaven nor earth will grant, 
and which are wholly incompatible with 
the performance of great actions, or the 
formation of great characters. In religion, 
this timid, selfish spirit, to whatever extent 
it may exist, is subversive of the best prin- 
ciples of the gospel. It is utterly incom- 
patible with faith, and in itself a mortal 
sin. We may not inquire too anxiously 
what Christ will demand of us in return 
for the blood he has shed and the heaven 
he has prepared for us ; but we know he 
wiU have nothing less than entire conse- 
cration; and that we are to be ever ready 
" not only to be bound, but also to die, for 
the name of the Lord Jesus." It is pre- 
cisely at this point of entire self-renun- 
ciation that the soul becomes endowed 
with the power of an endless life, and 
can do all things, through Christ. If this 
is an excellent attainment, usually reserved 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 63 

for advanced piety and matured gi'aces, it 
may, nevertheless, become the starting 
point of every Christian young man. Let 
him put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and 
make no provision for the flesh, and he 
obtains the mastery over all resources, 
human and divine, needful to the fulfill- 
ment of a glorious destiny. 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 65 



APPENDIX 



NOTE A.— Page 30. 



I SHALL have been greatly misunder- 
stood if it is inferred from the statements 
and reasonings of this discourse, that I enter- 
tain uncharitable views, or would call in 
question the sincere piety and Christian 
virtues of the religious denominations of 
this country. My single object is, to ex- 
pose a practical and most pernicious error, 
which is perpetually forced upon my atten- 
tion by my position, and by some acquaint- 
ance with the present condition of the 
American church. It is no reflection upon 
the conscientious and devout members of 
any Christian sect to intimate that persons, 
attracted to its communion, or its ministry, 
by other than strictly religious considera- 
tions, are not very likely to become emi- 
nent for Christian attainments or useful- 
ness. It is well understood, that such 

5 



66 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

proselytes are frequently admitted into 
their new relations with a degree of dis- 
trust and caution J of which no conjecture 
could be formed from the eclat which is 
given to their conversions by a sectarian 
press. In that particular branch of the 
church which numerically profits most by 
the tendency I have exposed, a conviction 
is evidently gaining ground, that it is better 
policy, upon the whole, to train up its own 
ministry than to open so wide a door to 
recruits from the seminaries and pulpits 
of other denominations. Moderate men 
are becoming startled at the vaulting speed 
with which the neophyte so generally 
hastens to embrace the most extreme 
opinions and policy known to his new 
sphere of speculation and activity ; while, 
to considerate men of all parties, it must 
be obvious, that however a deep, heredi- 
tary reverence for imposing forms, and 
high, exclusive claims, may be compatible 
with humble, evangelical piety in persons 
trained, from their childhood, under such 
influences, there may, at least, be some 
dajQger to the unstable, giddy mind of the 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 67 

novice, who, without any such safeguards, 
is suddenly brought in contact with ideas, 
to him so new and so magnificent. 

I hope I shall not be thought to bestow 
upon this topic a measure of attention 
greater than its intrinsic importance. As 
a practical question, its importance is every 
day increasing in this country, and the 
time may not be far away when it will 
force itself upon the consideration of all 
thoughtful minds. As a mere sectarian 
question, it may well enough be regarded 
as trivial ; for it is of little consequence to 
the enlightened Christian whether the los- 
ing party sufter more by mortification than 
the winning gains by the enjoyment of a 
petty triumph. There are considerations, 
however, of far deeper import both to the 
individual seceder and to the cause of our 
common Christianity. These easy transi- 
tions from the church in which we were 
reared, or into which we have been provi- 
dentially led to enter, on our conversion^ 
to another, however pure or orthodox, can 
hardly ever be effected without injury to 
the cause of Christ; and I must think 



68 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

them almost never innocent, unless when 
they are prompted by strictly conscientious 
motives. It would generally be better to 
submit to great inconveniences, and even 
to tolerate slight errors in doctrine or disci- 
pline, rather than resort to a remedy so 
violent and dangerous. To the individual 
himself it is likely to prove a very hazard- 
ous experiment to forsake the hereditary, 
or the chosen, communion for another. 
He deprives himself of advantages not to 
be expected from new religious associa- 
tions, however pure and elevating. Ties, 
which religion sanctifies and strengthens 
for itself, are weakened or broken asunder. 
The genial sympathies of domestic piety 
are chilled; the unquestioned authority 
of hereditary faith is shaken, and all 
the nameless influences that guard and 
help a youth, seeking and serving God in 
the midst of his kindred, and under the 
approving and watchful eyes of the good 
men with whose faces and names are 
associated his hallowed recollections and 
impressions of the Lord's house, are all 
utterly lost I will not affirm that such 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 69 

evils uniformly result from such defections, 
nor that they are, in all cases, of sufficient 
force to interfere fatally with the successful 
prosecution of a religious life. It is no 
exaggeration, however, to say that they are 
not of rare occurrence, and that they are 
wont to exert a very pernicious influence 
on personal piety. 

Evils, of a still graver character than 
any that befall the individual, are likely to 
follow such recreancy. In proportion to 
his position and influence does he inflict 
upon the church and the general interests 
of religion the greatest calamity ; not chiefly 
by withdrawing his talents and resources 
from their appropriate sphere of usefulness, 
but by grieving pious souls — by awaken- 
ing distrust of his own sincerity, and 
resentment for his recreancy, and by pro- 
voking uncharitableness, jealousy, sectari- 
anism, and evil-speaking, in multitudes of 
professing Christians. I have usually been 
led to doubt whether an influential layman 
or a minister can ever reasonably expect 
to do as much good, in any new church 
relations, as he unavoidably does harm 



70 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

by violating the old. It should be kept 
in view in estimating the probable effects 
of such changes, that a man never carries 
with him into his new field of action 
more than a small portion of the influence, 
and other means of usefulness, which he 
had acquired by faithful services and an 
upright walk. Of these he is destined to 
make, at least, a partial forfeiture by the 
transition, and years must probably elapse 
before he can regain the vantage ground 
which he has so lightly abandoned. Sus- 
pected, or denounced, by those whom he 
deserts, he must pass a long probation ere 
he wins the confidence of his new asso- 
ciates. 

Upon the irreligious world the effect 
of such instability is yet more observa- 
ble and pernicious. It leads to a dis- 
trust of all pretensions to piety, and goes 
far to confirm the too prevalent suspi- 
cion, that when educated or influential 
men become religious, they have com- 
monly some selfish end to subserve. 
What gives additional force to such sus- 
picions is the notorious fact that the transi- 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 71 

tion, frequently as it occurs of late, is almost 
never made where any personal sacrifice, 
present or prospective, is involved. I 
do not allow myself to doubt that, in 
several instances, at least, educated men 
and ministers have felt constrained to give 
up old, and contract new, church relations ; 
but I can scarcely recollect a case in which 
the change was made in the face of losses 
or sufferings. It is usually from low to 
higher salaries — from more to less labor 
or exposure — ^from less cultivated, or weal- 
thy, or fashionable communities, to those 
deemed more so. I would not dare express 
or indulge distrust in regard to the motives 
which, in any particular instance, may have 
led to such changes ; but the facts to which 
I have adverted are incontrovertible, as they 
are universally known. There are few 
observing or prominent Christians, I appre- 
hend, who have not had some occasion to 
receive, in silence, the cutting rebukes which 
irreligious men are accustomed to visit on 
such transactions. I am free to confess 
that, in my opinion, no measure of blame 
or reproaches can possibly transcend the 



72 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

demerits of a man who, for any reasons 
lower or weaker than such as are strictly 
conscientious and constraining, puts in 
jeopardy so many of the precious interests 
of religion. He beti'ays a sacred trust. 
Up to the full measure of his influence, 
and talents, and position, he inflicts a griev- 
ous wrong upon the communion in whose 
bosom he has been nurtured, or into which 
he has obtained admission. He dimi- 
nishes its ability to do good, and casts a 
doubt on its purity, or orthodoxy. If a 
minister, set apart and ordained as a teach- 
er of religion, and a dispenser of its holy 
sacraments, his power to do evil is greatly 
augmented, and with it the guilt of such 
a defection. His new investiture of eccle- 
siastical authority and dignity is equivalent 
to a public declaration that others are but 
rash intruders into the sacred office. He 
thus wounds their reputation and weakens 
their influence. As far as in him lies, he 
shakes the confidence of the people in their 
pastors, arid despoils their message of its 
power over the sinner's conscience. He 
denies the character and immunities of 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 73 

Christ's ministers, not to a few obscure 
individuals, but to nine-tenths of all the 
consecrated men upon whom the popula- 
tion of this great country depend for reli- 
gious instruction and consolation. I am 
ready to admit that conviction may be so 
clear and controlling as to make it a good 
man's duty to act in defiance of all these 
considerations ; but no sane mind can, for 
a moment, hesitate to believe that to do 
so, on lower grounds, is one of the gTavest 
offenses against religion of which a human 
being can be guilty. 



74 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 



NOTE B— Page 32. 

The strong tendency in our religious 
operations to gather the rich and the poor 
into separate folds, and so to generate and 
establish in the church distinctions utterly 
at variance with the spirit of our political 
institutions, is the very worst result of the 
multiplication of sects among us ; and I 
fear it must be admitted that the evil is 
greatly aggravated by the otherwise be- 
nignant working of the voluntary system. 
Without insisting fvuther upon the proba- 
ble or possible injury which may befall our 
free country from this conflict of agencies, 
ever the most powerful in the formation of 
national and individual character, no one, 
I am sure, can fail to recognize in this de- 
velopment an influence utterly and irre- 
concilably hostile to the genius and che- 
rished objects of Christianity. It is the 
peculiar glory of the gospel, that, even un- 
der the most arbitrary governments, it has 
usually been able to vindicate and practi- 
cally exemplify the essential equality of 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 75 

man. It has had one doctrine and one 
hope for all its children ; and the highest 
and the lowest have been constrained to 
acknowledge one holy law of brotherhood 
in the common faith of which they are 
made partakers. Nowhere else, I be- 
lieve, but in the United States — certainly 
nowhere else to the same extent — does 
this antichristian separation of classes pre- 
vail in the Christian church. The beggar 
in his tattered vestments walks the splendid 
courts of St. Peter's, and kneels at its costly 
altars by the side of dukes and cardinals. 
The peasant in his wooden shoes is wel- 
comed in the gorgeous churches of Notre 
Dame and the Madeline ; and even in 
England, where political and social dis- 
tinctions are more rigorously enforced than 
in any other country on earth, the lord and 
the peasant, the richest and the poorest, 
are usually occupants of the same church, 
and partakers of the same communion. 
That the reverse of all this is true in many 
parts of this country, every observing man 
knows full well : and what is yet more de- 
plorable, while the lines of demarkation 



76 RESOURCES ANB DUTIES OF 

between the different classes have abeady 
become sufficiently distinct, the tendency 
is receiving new strength and develop- 
ment in a rapidly augmenting ratio. Even 
in country places, where the population is 
sparse, and the artificial distinctions of so- 
ciety are little known, the working of this 
strange element is, in many instances, 
made manifest, and a petty coterie of vil- 
lage magnates may be found worshiping 
God apart from the body of the people. 
But the evil is much more apparent, as 
well as more deeply seated, in our populous 
towns, where the causes which produce it 
have been longer in operation, and have 
more fully enjoyed the favor of circum- 
stances. In these great centres of wealth, 
intelligence, and influence, the separation 
between the classes is, in many instances, 
complete, and in many more the process 
is rapidly progressive. There are crowded 
religious congTegations composed so ex- 
clusively of the wealthy as scarcely to em- 
brace an indigent family or individual; 
and the number of such churches, where 
the gospel is never preached to the poor, 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 77 

is constantly increasing. Rich men, in- 
stead of associating themselves with their 
more humble fellow Christians, where 
their money as well as their influence and 
counsels are so much needed, usually 
combine to erect magnificent churches, in 
which sittings are too expensive for any 
but people of fortune, and from w^hich their 
less-favored brethren are as effectually and 
peremptorily excluded as if there were dis- 
honor or contagion in their presence. A 
congregation is thus constituted, able, 
without the slightest inconvenience, to 
bear the pecuniary burdens of twenty 
churches, monopolizing and consigning 
to comparative inactivity intellectual, mo- 
ral, and material resources, for want of 
which so many other congregations are 
doomed to struggle with the most em- 
barrassing difficulties. Can it for a mo- 
ment be thought, that such a state of things 
is desirable, or in harmony with the spirit 
and design of the gospel? 

A more difficult question arises w^hen 
we inquire after a remedy for evils too 
glaring to be overlooked, and too grave to 



78 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

be tolerated without an effort to palliate, if 
not to remove them. The most obvious 
palliative, and one which has already been 
tried to some extent by wealthy churches 
or individuals, is the erection of free places 
of worship for the poor. Such a provi- 
sion for this class of persons would be 
more effectual in any other part of the 
world than in the United States. Whether 
it arises from the operation of our political 
system, or from the easy attainment of at 
least the prime necessaries of life, the 
poorer classes here are characterized by a 
proud spirit, which will not submit to re- 
ceive even the highest benefits in any form 
that implies inferiority or dependence. 
This strong and prevalent feeling must 
continue to interpose serious obstacles in 
the way of these laudable attempts. If in 
a few instances churches for the poor have 
succeeded in our large cities, where the 
theory of social equality is so imperfectly 
realized in the actual condition of the peo- 
ple, and where the presence of a multitude 
of indigent foreigners tends to lower the 
sentiment of independence so strong in 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 79 

native-born Americans, the system is yet 
manifestly incapable of general application 
to the religious wants of our population. 
The same difficulty usually occurs in all 
attempts to induce the humbler classes to 
worship with the rich in sumptuous 
churches by reserving for their benefit a 
portion of the sittings free, or at a nominal 
rent A few only can be found who are 
willing to be recognized and provided for 
as beneficiaries and paupers, while the 
multitude will always prefer to make great 
sacrifices in order to provide for themselves 
in some humbler fane. It must be ad- 
mitted that this subject is beset with 
practical difficulties, which are not likely 
to be removed speedily, or without some 
great and improbable revolution in our 
religious affairs. Yet if the respectable 
Christian denominations most concerned 
in the subject shall pursue a wise and 
liberal policy for the future, something may 
be done to check the evil. They may re- 
tard its rapid growth, perhaps, though it 
will most likely be found impossible to 
eradicate it altogether. It ought to be weU 



80 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

understood, that the muhiplication of mag- 
nificent churches is dayly making the line 
of demarkation between the rich and the poor 
more and more palpable and impassable. 
There are many good reasons for the erec- 
tion of such edifices Increasing wealth and 
civilization seem to c all for a liberal and taste- 
ful outlay in behalf of religion, yet is it the 
dictate of prudence no less than of duty 
to balance carefully the good and the evil 
of every enterprise. It should ever be kept 
in mind, that such a church virtually writes 
above its sculptured portals an irrevocable 
prohibition to the poor, " Procul o procul 
este profani." 

I wiU not pretend to determine how 
far it might be wise, even if it were 
practicable, to check the liberal spirit now 
so active in multiplying sumptuous re- 
ligious edifices. We have perhaps more 
encouragement to look in another direc- 
tion for the melioration desired. There 
can be no doubt that a general increase of 
humble, spiritual religion would operate 
as a powerful check upon the prevailing 
disposition to prefer communion with opu- 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 81 

lent congregations, rather than pursue the 
walks of a lowlier piety in company with 
the poor. The same good ends would be 
further promoted by the increasing preva- 
lence of a liberal catholic spiiit. A de- 
cided and simultaneous advance in piety 
and charity, though it should stop short of 
harmonizing conflicting sects and opinions, 
and bringing their votaries to worship in a 
common temple, might yet be sufficient to 
reach and considerably mitigate some of 
the greatest hardships to which I have ad- 
verted. In such an improved state of 
Christian sentiment, a congregation, or a 
sect, opulent in intellectual or pecuniary 
means, beyond the ratio of its numbers, 
might easily confer the greatest benefits 
on the feeble and destitute. A wealthy 
denomination wdth few of the poor under 
its ministry, and with little access to this 
class, would then be inclined to aid those 
who are providentially called to preach the 
gospel to the masses. How easily might 
one of our great metropolitan churches re- 
lieve a dozen poor congregations from the 

burden of debts, or other embarrassments, 

6 



82 RESOURCES AND DUTIES OF 

under which they are left to struggle on 
from year to year ! What inestimable bene- 
fits might a denomination, at once the 
smallest and richest, confer by aiding the 
poorer sects in extending the blessings of 
religion and education to the vast multi- 
tude placed by divine Providence under 
their influence and watchcare! Now it 
can hardly be doubted, that with such an 
enlargement of charity as I have supposed, 
there would come more enlarged views of 
duty and privilege, and that sectarian lines 
might cease to be insuperable barriers in 
the way of a far more exuberant and diffu- 
sive liberality than now prevails. Under 
such better auspices it would at least be 
no longer possible for opulent, enlightened 
Christian denominations to look with hos- 
tility or even indifference upon their fel- 
low-laborers in the vineyard of a common 
Master. The sympathies as well as the 
resources of the whole Christian church 
would look about in quest of its wants and 
substantial interests: while there would 
inevitably arise bonds of brotherhood, so 
many and so strong, between all the mem- 



CHRISTIAN YOUNG MEN. 83 

bers of the one Christian family, as would go 
far to exclude all the petty jealousies and 
heart-burnings which \vealth and position 
are sure to provoke in the church no less 
than in the world, when they forget their 
proper mission. 

One lesson more, we should imagine, 
would be ineftaceably impressed upon those 
Christian denominations which, through 
providential means or their own special 
adaptations and exertions, monopolize a 
large portion of the influential classes, 
wliile they have signally failed of obtain- 
ing a corresponding development among 
the great body of the people. It is a lesson 
of enlarged catholic liberality. They have, 
in their relative position, a clear demonstra- 
tion at least that others as well as they 
have a dispensation of the gospel commit- 
ted to them. That, surely, cannot be the 
only apostolic and legitimate system of 
faith or polity, which, after an experiment 
carried tlu^ouo^h successive o:enerations of 
men, has, in this country, shown itself essen- 
tially incapable of penetrating the masses. 
They who evangelize the wealthy, the 



84 RESOURCES AND DUTIES, ETC. 

intellectual, and the refined, do unques- 
tionably perform a good work ; and there 
may be those who have a special vocation 
to this inviting field. No liberal-minded 
Christian will undervalue their efforts, or 
desire to call in question the genuineness 
of their piety, or the validity of their eccle- 
siastical system ; but it may be well for all 
parties to remember that there are signs of 
apostleship older and surer than this mission 
to the rich ; and they need not despair of 
making good their claim to a part in this 
ministry who can appeal, as their Master 
did, to eminent success among the masses, 
and affirm, like him, that through their in- 
strumentality " the blind receive their sight 
and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed 
and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up 
and THE POOR have the gospel preached 

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